I really like how my climbing gym does it with putting the second clip on the flag/ground holder. Then they can just clip it into the swivel before the climber unhooks themselves from the auto belay to ensure it doesn't go flying. No need to have them both on the auto belay line itself.
Haha, nah just clip any excess gear to a gear loop. Trad climbing is a clown fiesta when it comes to gear swinging around. But you get used to it, dont think its optimal for a gym setting though
Same way my gym does it. Clip the autobelay to yourself, then unclip the flag from the swivel. When done, clip the flag on the swivel, unclip yourself. Pretty simple and quick
Thank goodness the gym is using a rated sling and locker as the keeper. If you can’t trust people not to let go, you can’t trust them to clip into the right biner. Also, if the retrieval process is as easy as climbing the route next door and grabbing the line, no need to complicate the system. Adding unnecessary components makes it more confusing, and this video’s case, potentially dangerous.
Our local gyms have like 2-3 auto belays. The other 100routes are toprope (aproximatly 20%) and the rest is for sport climbing so chances are high youll need to really climb the route next to it, involving atleast 2 people. Not that thats a bad thing, as ive made it a free beer chore to get the autobelays back down. (Person who let it fly up needs to buy me a beer to get it back down) and that has lead to some pretty nice flash and onsight climbing for me, as i ussually stay very clear of the auto belay areas.
At our gym, we have a carabiner on the anchor that clips to the swivel so the climber's 'biner is free to clip and unclip. HeadRush Tech has also designed their own carabiner for their TruBlue line that has a hole for a secondary attachment point if desired in the exact location you point out. Edit: deleted duplicate words
My gym has what is basically half a quick draw on the bottom warning thing. Then you clip that into the auto belay thing first. Then when you attach the auto belay to yourself, you unclipped the quick draw and your just left with the auto belay carabiner, with the cable able to swivel
The gyms here in minnesota just leave the 2nd one hanging to clip into first. That solves your problem, you're making it more complicated than it needs to be. Your welcome
One guy gets on spins clips it then next guy gets on spins clips it then it’s a big twisted mess. Possibly jamming hazard I think if you get enough noobs together.
Where I work we have the new clip in carabiners that have an eyelet on the side. We have a carabiner on the flag that clips to the eyelet and is super easy to use for kids aswell
The gym I work at uses a swivel detached from the main carabiner, allowing the backup carabiner to be strapped to the lower half of the swivel, and still being separated from the main carabiner
Never seen these lengths before! In England we simply have a piece of cord which stays attached to the clip and dangles to the ground if you let go of it. Very cheap and practical! Interesting to see other countries using heavy gear to achieve this.
Never seen that configuration before. My gyms have a carabiner that lives on the safety flag, and once you are clipped in/back on the ground, you attach the flag to the spine of the locker before exiting the system.
The tension from the auto belay pulling on the line puts way more friction on the swivel than the twisted line can overcome to turn it. I work in a climbing gym and have tested this
Honestly one clip is good practice not screwing up, if you're going to be trusting your life to climbing gear you should be able to not let go of a biner when you shouldn't
So the swivel is made redundant completely. Clip the red on the harness, unclip the main, clip the main into the harness, climb,return to ground, clip the red into the retainer, clip the main into the retainer, whats the point the swivel?
In Poland, about a month ago, because of this additional carabiner, there was an accident in which the tape/lanyard/leash (I don't know if it's the correct English word) rubbed.
@@stardust5987 Yep. I saw a photo of a torn lanyard / leash (I don't know if it's the correct English word) from this accident and because she was twisted all the time she looked terrible. She broke away about 3 meters from the carabiner. As far as I know, the device had an up-to-date inspection.
Don't clip both into the anchor point, just the shorter one and you won't have a problem. All the auto belays that I've seen have a swivel above the two carabiners.
It is possible to just clip in to the auto belay and then unclip the triangle, that's what I've been doing. The only trick is that you have to make sure to move the triangle loop to the proper position before you clip yourself in so that your belay loop isn't trapping the triangle loop in place. No need for a second carabiner or extra hardware or anything, just be a little bit more clever.
I also see a danger of someone clippings the red, uncoupling the main from the retainer, climbing, then clipping the main back into the retainer and finally unclipping the red which in effect negated the actual main carabiner.
They have done this completely backwards. The gym I go to has a sling with a biner hanging from an eye hook on the wall. You clip the biner into the swivel part before unclipping yourself, and vice versa.
Ever since a friend of mine was one of the handful of seriously injured climbers circa 2008-09 (dropped 15m to concrete, shattered heels, compressed disks) from older autobelays failing to lock, I've been wary of them even though I know the issues are supposed to have been fixed. This doesn't really make me feel better.
Our local gym had a death on an autobelay pretty recently. They claimed the problem was human error but I'm genuinely pretty skeptical as I don't really see how you can mess it up and they won't release the specific details.
@@sc9160 The only human errors i could think of is to not clip in, or climb to much to the side/over the autobelay. As you say it is pretty recently the last part might be because of legal issues
@@olesvren2906 Climbing to the side should not get you killed, unless you climb farther to the side than vertical distance to the ground, which seems very unrealistic. And the auto-belay should be positioned at the top of the route, so you should not be able to climb above it…
I always pull auto belays down, then step on them with enough slack so i can clip in and if I drop it in the process the webbing doesn't fly up to the top...Its the only time stepping on rope stuff is ok lol
Really dangerous Safety System, especially when u climb without clipping in because nobody double checked you (so happend to a climber in Germany on Christmas a few years ago, luckily the owner of the Gym saws the girl at the top, yelled to her, climbed up in slippers to clip both in) by the way, is there a backup needed or is one carabiner enough???
One is enough, the second one is only there to make sure that the line is always anchored to something. Whether that be the climber's harness or an anchor point on the ground. The gym is trying to prevent instances where they will have to go up and retrieve a line that someone accidentally let go of when clipping in/unclipping.
I always make sure to twist it back before every climb. It actually feels scary if I don't. I think that's the real problem here though. Not telling people to untwist it before climbing, so it just stays that way for multiple ascents. I think if it stayed twisted while clipped to the flag, it should be fine so long as it isn't climbed like that. I could be wrong though. I don't know the inner mechanics to auto belays so take what I say with a grain of salt
Yes, it can happen. Saw a guy climbing almost half of an autobelay route in one gym, with the top jammed from the twisting so that no cord was pulled into the autobelay. We managed to run over and get his attention so that he could climb down again. Super scary, he would have decked if he fell.....
It happened last month in Poland - they installed some additional quickdraw, that made the whole tape spin. Because of the constant rubbing, the tape wore off (in span of few Months) and one guy fell from the top. :F
@@gooz0mbie hey buddy. What kind of proof would you like? The first accident happened around 10-12 years back when the man reached the top he positioned himself for the decent it never stopped his fall . He crashed to te ground breaking both ankles. The second one I have less details. But similar story. Device failure guy crashes to the ground some broken bones.
@@kevinsimard crazy. Any ideas on the brand for those? I mean they’re just so standard these days and I’ve never heard of a failure. Maybe they’re safer now? Not sure
@@gooz0mbie one was perfect decent the other I don't know. If you search a little bit there are several accidents. I know those devices are generally very safe but I still don't climb on them nor use them at work. Cheers.
I let them run to the top all the time when they're in the way of a route I want to lead. Is that bad? I just grab it on the way back down when I'm done
@@rustledjimmies1337 Well often times you can get to the top once you don't stick to one route, right? If you can use anything on the wall? Would still require you to care enough to do it. These are odd to me anyways, in Germany you hardly see these in climbing gyms
I don't see a reason to attach anything but yourself to the autobelay. Why add another step to an otherwise easy system that someone, particularly a noob, can mess up? Autobelays are generally very safe with user error, such as forgetting to clip in, and not equipment failure, being the cause of most accidents. Using a sling to keep from losing the autobelay is silly and lazy from a staff perspective. Gyms have staff and all it takes is for them or a party climbing a neighboring route to recover it.
Totally agree. Require all new climbers go through a quick instruction (even children) on the use of auto belays. That cuts down on a bunch of issues. If the noob (usually a child) messes up, it literally takes less than a minute to retrieve the auto belay rope. They are just introducing additional issues by using two carabiners.
Using a sling makes complete sense. This gym has implemented it backwards. Not all gyms are big enough to have staff wasting time retrieving autobelays.
@@gimmepowder If a gym doesn't have the staff to retrieve the auto belay, then a gym quickdraw, where the quicklink end is attached directly to the "belay gate" (the big banner attached to the lanyard of the auto belay) with the carabiner end attached to the swivel, can be an option. This leaves the carabiner attached to the auto belay lanyard free to just pull down and attach to the belay loop of the harness. All a climber would have to do then is disconnect the belay gate from the swivel and off they go. A sling from the swivel inevitably will result in a climber attaching themselves to it rather than the carabiner from the lanyard.
@@morefreepress That's basically what my gym has but using webbing with a nonlocker on the end as the tether. I read your comment as saying that anything to hold the autobelay at the bottom of the climb other than the biner used to attach yourself was pointless and lazy. The gym I belong to doesn't have the "gate." It takes very little to get new climbers to clip themselves in before releasing the tether, and to attach the tether before unclipping. As I said, this particular gym has done things in a really strange way.
I really like how my climbing gym does it with putting the second clip on the flag/ground holder. Then they can just clip it into the swivel before the climber unhooks themselves from the auto belay to ensure it doesn't go flying. No need to have them both on the auto belay line itself.
This. Are you supposed to clip both to yourself? Either way, having the 2nd carabiner loosely bouncing around as you climb sounds annoying.
Haha, nah just clip any excess gear to a gear loop.
Trad climbing is a clown fiesta when it comes to gear swinging around. But you get used to it, dont think its optimal for a gym setting though
Same way my gym does it. Clip the autobelay to yourself, then unclip the flag from the swivel. When done, clip the flag on the swivel, unclip yourself. Pretty simple and quick
i really like the powerscream at 0:44
Thank goodness the gym is using a rated sling and locker as the keeper. If you can’t trust people not to let go, you can’t trust them to clip into the right biner.
Also, if the retrieval process is as easy as climbing the route next door and grabbing the line, no need to complicate the system. Adding unnecessary components makes it more confusing, and this video’s case, potentially dangerous.
Our local gyms have like 2-3 auto belays. The other 100routes are toprope (aproximatly 20%) and the rest is for sport climbing so chances are high youll need to really climb the route next to it, involving atleast 2 people.
Not that thats a bad thing, as ive made it a free beer chore to get the autobelays back down. (Person who let it fly up needs to buy me a beer to get it back down) and that has lead to some pretty nice flash and onsight climbing for me, as i ussually stay very clear of the auto belay areas.
At our gym, we have a carabiner on the anchor that clips to the swivel so the climber's 'biner is free to clip and unclip. HeadRush Tech has also designed their own carabiner for their TruBlue line that has a hole for a secondary attachment point if desired in the exact location you point out.
Edit: deleted duplicate words
Every gym I’ve ever been to has a carabiner at the anchor lol. I just assumed it was everywhere. Never seen the setup from the vid.
people should un-swivel it themselves after they clip in....i always do when it's all twisted up.
In Austria, our auto belays had always 2 biners with a swivel above them....
My gym has what is basically half a quick draw on the bottom warning thing. Then you clip that into the auto belay thing first. Then when you attach the auto belay to yourself, you unclipped the quick draw and your just left with the auto belay carabiner, with the cable able to swivel
Sounds like the right way to do it.
Right way to do it is just to have one carabiner, I have seen it dropped once in 3 years. No big deal.
It just bothers my ocd 🤣
Very understandable, please move along sir. Have a good day
Wait is that method in Newark
OUAT there was a recall for the pin backing out on the swivel so I'm fine using the second biner too.
Already available. See the manufacturer website for details of the dual carabiner lanyard.
The gyms here in minnesota just leave the 2nd one hanging to clip into first. That solves your problem, you're making it more complicated than it needs to be. Your welcome
Our auto belay system is also way smoother than other ones I've tried. Others can do a pretty hard catch on a static rope which isn't fun
I thought you said people spin around after clipping in and I tried figuring out how that would even work
One guy gets on spins clips it then next guy gets on spins clips it then it’s a big twisted mess. Possibly jamming hazard I think if you get enough noobs together.
i pictured that for a sec too lol
Where I work we have the new clip in carabiners that have an eyelet on the side. We have a carabiner on the flag that clips to the eyelet and is super easy to use for kids aswell
I get to the gym earlier and do some maintenance and this is one of the things i fix 😂
The gym I work at uses a swivel detached from the main carabiner, allowing the backup carabiner to be strapped to the lower half of the swivel, and still being separated from the main carabiner
I also just clip in and spin around until the twists are out... The vertigo adds to the challenge😆
Never seen these lengths before! In England we simply have a piece of cord which stays attached to the clip and dangles to the ground if you let go of it. Very cheap and practical! Interesting to see other countries using heavy gear to achieve this.
Never seen that configuration before. My gyms have a carabiner that lives on the safety flag, and once you are clipped in/back on the ground, you attach the flag to the spine of the locker before exiting the system.
The tension from the auto belay pulling on the line puts way more friction on the swivel than the twisted line can overcome to turn it.
I work in a climbing gym and have tested this
They can put another swivel on the bottom piece
If its, you could clip in like you suggested in the video and simply unclip the "extra" carabiner and untwist the rope?
good to know so now I can look for that
Honestly one clip is good practice not screwing up, if you're going to be trusting your life to climbing gear you should be able to not let go of a biner when you shouldn't
Use the swivel when it is attached to the harness…
I just only clip into the swivel and leave the second one unclipped from my harness
So the swivel is made redundant completely. Clip the red on the harness, unclip the main, clip the main into the harness, climb,return to ground, clip the red into the retainer, clip the main into the retainer, whats the point the swivel?
should just have the sling girthed to the ground loop. same but reversed orderwith carabiners on both ends
I just usually use my own personal anchor to prevent accidental letting go.
In Poland, about a month ago, because of this additional carabiner, there was an accident in which the tape/lanyard/leash (I don't know if it's the correct English word) rubbed.
Are you refering to Makak gym?
@@stardust5987 Yep. I saw a photo of a torn lanyard / leash (I don't know if it's the correct English word) from this accident and because she was twisted all the time she looked terrible. She broke away about 3 meters from the carabiner. As far as I know, the device had an up-to-date inspection.
Don't clip both into the anchor point, just the shorter one and you won't have a problem. All the auto belays that I've seen have a swivel above the two carabiners.
we dont have to double clip at brooklyn boulders
Method is the first gym I have ever been to that had the double clip
Just need a swivel on the bottom black loop .
My gym has a bunch of autos in a row so it’s no problem if one goes, usually just if there’s a field trip or noob anyways
Clip in first then unconnect from the triangle never lose it up there again.
It is possible to just clip in to the auto belay and then unclip the triangle, that's what I've been doing. The only trick is that you have to make sure to move the triangle loop to the proper position before you clip yourself in so that your belay loop isn't trapping the triangle loop in place.
No need for a second carabiner or extra hardware or anything, just be a little bit more clever.
Yeah that would work in a perfect world. It’s started to get hard to have ppl clip in at all. Lol
I also see a danger of someone clippings the red, uncoupling the main from the retainer, climbing, then clipping the main back into the retainer and finally unclipping the red which in effect negated the actual main carabiner.
They have done this completely backwards. The gym I go to has a sling with a biner hanging from an eye hook on the wall. You clip the biner into the swivel part before unclipping yourself, and vice versa.
Just attach it to your harness fist then twist it back before you start climbing
The feed can go into the belay device twisted just fine, that's what they're made for.
My climbing gym just had these installed but I don't trust em 😁
If you push yourself away from the wall it's less scary
@@porth5165 I have an excellent belayer one I can trust not to break down, unless he parties to hard 😎
Easily avoidable if people just don't rocket that auto belay up...
You could also just clip into it and then the swivel can unravel…
Huh, never seen that before.
Ever since a friend of mine was one of the handful of seriously injured climbers circa 2008-09 (dropped 15m to concrete, shattered heels, compressed disks) from older autobelays failing to lock, I've been wary of them even though I know the issues are supposed to have been fixed. This doesn't really make me feel better.
Our local gym had a death on an autobelay pretty recently. They claimed the problem was human error but I'm genuinely pretty skeptical as I don't really see how you can mess it up and they won't release the specific details.
@@sc9160 that last bit would make me sceptical as well.
@@sc9160 The only human errors i could think of is to not clip in, or climb to much to the side/over the autobelay. As you say it is pretty recently the last part might be because of legal issues
@@olesvren2906 Climbing to the side should not get you killed, unless you climb farther to the side than vertical distance to the ground, which seems very unrealistic.
And the auto-belay should be positioned at the top of the route, so you should not be able to climb above it…
I always pull auto belays down, then step on them with enough slack so i can clip in and if I drop it in the process the webbing doesn't fly up to the top...Its the only time stepping on rope stuff is ok lol
Or when you clip in you can just turn it before you climb
Really dangerous Safety System, especially when u climb without clipping in because nobody double checked you (so happend to a climber in Germany on Christmas a few years ago, luckily the owner of the Gym saws the girl at the top, yelled to her, climbed up in slippers to clip both in) by the way, is there a backup needed or is one carabiner enough???
One is enough, the second one is only there to make sure that the line is always anchored to something. Whether that be the climber's harness or an anchor point on the ground. The gym is trying to prevent instances where they will have to go up and retrieve a line that someone accidentally let go of when clipping in/unclipping.
I've seen this at our local gym
I always make sure to twist it back before every climb. It actually feels scary if I don't. I think that's the real problem here though. Not telling people to untwist it before climbing, so it just stays that way for multiple ascents. I think if it stayed twisted while clipped to the flag, it should be fine so long as it isn't climbed like that. I could be wrong though. I don't know the inner mechanics to auto belays so take what I say with a grain of salt
Is that a public service announcement announcement?
Toppas Autobelay devices have two carabiners on the swivel. Just saying...
2 swivels
Why just do not clip the second one to the ground loop? Let it swing loosely
👏👏👏
Does this twisted strap-rope cause problems feeding into the auto belay system?
Would have to test it but from experience you don’t want a bunch of twists jammed into a device
Yes, it can happen. Saw a guy climbing almost half of an autobelay route in one gym, with the top jammed from the twisting so that no cord was pulled into the autobelay. We managed to run over and get his attention so that he could climb down again. Super scary, he would have decked if he fell.....
It happened last month in Poland - they installed some additional quickdraw, that made the whole tape spin. Because of the constant rubbing, the tape wore off (in span of few Months) and one guy fell from the top. :F
looks like out of the 80s. check self delays in germany
oof this threw me into a fit of laughter. was this a joke or do people actually do this?
That's method lol
Just clip in and then unswivel it.
I would never climb off of those. I personally know two people that have fallen and the auto belayer did not function causing great injury.
Any proof? That’s basically impossible with the way they’re made
@@gooz0mbie hey buddy.
What kind of proof would you like?
The first accident happened around 10-12 years back when the man reached the top he positioned himself for the decent it never stopped his fall . He crashed to te ground breaking both ankles. The second one I have less details. But similar story. Device failure guy crashes to the ground some broken bones.
@@kevinsimard crazy. Any ideas on the brand for those? I mean they’re just so standard these days and I’ve never heard of a failure. Maybe they’re safer now? Not sure
@@gooz0mbie one was perfect decent the other I don't know. If you search a little bit there are several accidents. I know those devices are generally very safe but I still don't climb on them nor use them at work. Cheers.
@@kevinsimard fair enough, thanks for the info
big oof
Get rid of the second biner it is not needed.
Just remove the sling and clip the flag to the swivel.
I let them run to the top all the time when they're in the way of a route I want to lead. Is that bad? I just grab it on the way back down when I'm done
what if you have to abandon the route you're leading?
@@rustledjimmies1337 Well often times you can get to the top once you don't stick to one route, right? If you can use anything on the wall? Would still require you to care enough to do it. These are odd to me anyways, in Germany you hardly see these in climbing gyms
Wow this gym displays a complete lack of mechanical understanding.
How common is it for climbing UA-camrs to have a nasally voice?… then I looked down, oh it’s Beta climber, never mind 😂 lol… you da man beta!!😆
I’m offended and not as the same time 🤣🤙🏻
I don't see a reason to attach anything but yourself to the autobelay. Why add another step to an otherwise easy system that someone, particularly a noob, can mess up? Autobelays are generally very safe with user error, such as forgetting to clip in, and not equipment failure, being the cause of most accidents. Using a sling to keep from losing the autobelay is silly and lazy from a staff perspective. Gyms have staff and all it takes is for them or a party climbing a neighboring route to recover it.
usually, with most climbing accidents overall, it's not equipment failure...
Totally agree. Require all new climbers go through a quick instruction (even children) on the use of auto belays. That cuts down on a bunch of issues. If the noob (usually a child) messes up, it literally takes less than a minute to retrieve the auto belay rope. They are just introducing additional issues by using two carabiners.
Using a sling makes complete sense. This gym has implemented it backwards. Not all gyms are big enough to have staff wasting time retrieving autobelays.
@@gimmepowder If a gym doesn't have the staff to retrieve the auto belay, then a gym quickdraw, where the quicklink end is attached directly to the "belay gate" (the big banner attached to the lanyard of the auto belay) with the carabiner end attached to the swivel, can be an option. This leaves the carabiner attached to the auto belay lanyard free to just pull down and attach to the belay loop of the harness. All a climber would have to do then is disconnect the belay gate from the swivel and off they go. A sling from the swivel inevitably will result in a climber attaching themselves to it rather than the carabiner from the lanyard.
@@morefreepress That's basically what my gym has but using webbing with a nonlocker on the end as the tether. I read your comment as saying that anything to hold the autobelay at the bottom of the climb other than the biner used to attach yourself was pointless and lazy. The gym I belong to doesn't have the "gate." It takes very little to get new climbers to clip themselves in before releasing the tether, and to attach the tether before unclipping. As I said, this particular gym has done things in a really strange way.
At my gym we don’t believe in auto belay
Auto belays suck
Just get top rope. Sucks cuz u need a partner but it works