Chockstone Forum

      Sponsored By
      ROCK
   HARDWARE

Chockstone Photography

Australian Landscape Prints

Chockstone Forum - Gear Lust / Lost & Found

Rave About Your Rack Please do not post retail SPAM.

Topic Date User

predictions on ring failure loads 30-Nov-2010 At 12:15:55 PM voodoo

Message

Yeah, I don't even know if it'd be good for that. The failure modes your U's have all been showing is essentially peeling themselves open and out of the rock. Seeing as they're already well mis-shapen from regular use, you'd think that 5mm wouldn't provide much resistance to bending under heavy load. And secondly, the area of glue bond would have to be pretty bloody small indeed - these things look tiny! Sure would be interesting to put some numbers to experimentally.

I note that on The Reprieve even the lower offs are made from 5mm stock. Reading a back issue of Rock and Ice the other day (#133, June 2004) they were highlighting the, often overlooked, forces at play in bog-standard top-rope setup. In their experiment, with a 90kg climber falling on a lazy belay (120cm of slack with 11m of rope out) they were generating loads in excess of 7kN. So it's not just big lead whippers that push out some high forces on fixed gear, but even a climb style that many take as harmless (or the soft option).