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This feature article was snagged from Knots for climbing and
mountaineering: How many knots do you use in your
climbing? Which ones do you use most frequently, and why? Do
you have a reason, or is it just the knot you learned, once
upon a time, and you know it well and won't screw it up, so
what the heck? A lot has been written about knots.
Some people seem to love knots of all kinds. They pick them up
the first time they see them, and are able to dazzle and
impress their friends by whipping them out at, say, cocktail
parties. Others struggle to learn one or two knots reliably,
and suffer so much humiliation at their friends' pointedly
patient help, that they avoid even trying to learn any they
aren't absolutely convinced they will use every time they use
the rope. Most of us fall somewhere in between. We tend to
limit the number of knots we use to those that seem versatile
and useful for most common climbing tasks. While we may get
excited when we see a new and cool knot, we don't add it to
our repertoire unless we're convinced it's truly superior for
a certain purpose that's important to us. My goal here isn't to teach any
knots (I can't do that without diagrams, and even they are
hard for many of us to use) but rather to examine the choices
we make, or should be making, in choosing one knot over
another, for specific common purposes. Hopefully this will
help make these choices clearer and more common sensical when
they seem to be muddy, or just a matter of personal
preference. The choice of the best knot for a given purpose is
rarely purely arbitrary or aesthetic. Tying In :
Re-threaded Figure 8. Everybody
learned this as their very first climbing knot, right? It's
simple, strong, and easy to see whether it's correct and
complete or not. Is there any reason at all to use any other
kind of knot for tying in to the rope? If you've ever taken multiple
whippers "working" a problem, you've learned that the bowline
is a heck of a lot easier to untie when it's really welded
tight and your forearms are pumped out. Most sport climbers
have a favorite variation on the bowline for tying in, for
this reason. So why hasn't it replaced the old standby, the
Figure 8? So your decision on which knot to
tie in with should be governed by considerations such as:
given your climbing objective today, is the knot likely to
take weight often and get welded? Can you tie the bowline
including an adequate back-up, tie it correctly every time,
and tell quickly if it's right or not? Joining Rappel Ropes
: There are several knots commonly
used for this purpose, and therefore a lot of discussion about
the best one or ones to use. The first consideration of course
is whether or not the ropes to be joined are of roughly equal
or very different diameters. If the ropes are of very
different diameters, say about 4mm different, most people use
the double fisherman or grapevine knot to join them. The
advantages to this knot are: Problems with the grapevine are
several: Nevertheless, if the difference
between the ropes amounts to about 4mm, this is arguably the
best knot to use because of its relative compactness and its
reliability. If the difference in diameters
exceeds about 4mm, then a better strategy is to not rappel on
double strands at all, but to rig a retrieval line system
which has you rappelling essentially only on the thicker rope.
(This procedure is too difficult for me to describe here
without diagrams, and that's not part of my goal here, but if
you don't know it and are curious, talk to a mountain guide or
other experienced climber familiar with it. I'm not aware that
it is described in any books I've seen). If the ropes are roughly of the
same diameter (the difference being up to 2 to 3 mm), a flat
figure 8 or flat overhand are commonly used. There are a
couple of important advantages to these knots. There are a couple of important
cautions too, however: In some tests I heard about which
were apparently done informally by Blue Water, great loads
were applied to both these knots to see how they would behave
and under what conditions this rolling problem would happen,
and what the result would be. Although I have never seen this
information written up, and don't know the exact results, (if
anyone has, please let me know!) I have heard the upshot was
that the flat figure 8 rolled over itself under somewhat less
load than the flat overhand, and that it rolled more times
(twice I believe, as opposed to once for the overhand). Both
knots eventually tightened and locked up as they rolled, and
the ropes then broke at some ridiculously high load - in other
words strength of both knots was not an issue. As long as
there was enough tail to accommodate the rolling, both knots
stayed tied even under very high loads. Important: Do NOT tie a back up
knot with either of these knots: it is unnecessary, and
defeats the purpose the knots are chosen for - low bulk and
ease of snag-less retrieval. Given that these are both
adequately strong knots if tied carefully, which is better?
Well, the flat overhand is the least bulky, so it is best at
the purpose of presenting less to snag or jam. The figure 8
provides slightly more friction, but it's hard to say if this
is ever significant enough to matter. I think the choice is
pretty close and slightly favors the overhand because of the
bulk question, but it seems to me there's room for aesthetic
preferences here, or even flipping a coin. I tend to use an
overhand with ropes of less than 2mm difference in diameter
between them, and the figure 8 at 2-3mm difference in
diameter. Tying into an anchor
: The two most common methods are the
figure 8 on a bight, and the clove hitch. The advantage of the
clove hitch is that it is fast and easy to tie, and allows for
easy adjustment of the climber's distance from the anchor,
without her needing to untie from the anchor. This latter
advantage is pretty significant, in my view. The challenges
are learning to tie it right reliably and to recognize quickly
when it's wrong, and remembering always to snug it down tight.
An important note on the clove
hitch: always use a locking carabiner, and always make sure
it's locked! Duh, you say, as if that weren't always
important. True, but even more so than ever with the clove,
which could deform, conceivably in such a way as to bring a
strand across the gate, if it is not snugged down carefully.
Basically, the only time I
personally would NOT prefer the clove hitch over the 8 for
tying myself into the anchor is if I weren't sure I could do
the clove right. If I'm that rattled, an overhand on a bight
will do. Joining a Cordelette :
Most people tie up their
cordelettes into a loop using a double fisherman or grapevine.
Others use the flat overhand or figure 8. For the purposes of
equalizing several pieces into a belay anchor, any of these
three knots is fine, as the central knot tied to equalize,
creates such redundancy that the strand with the joining knot
in question is carrying only a fraction of the load on the
anchor. Some people like to be prepared to use their
cordelettes in an untied single strand however, say for
hauling or rescue purposes. They prefer the flat 8 or overhand
over the grapevine, because of their ease of untying for these
uses. Tying in to the rope for
glacier travel purposes : In this instance we are usually
tying in somewhere along the rope other than the end, and
attaching ourselves by means of a pair of locking and
non-locking carabiners, reversed and opposed. Should we
consider any other knot besides the figure 8 on a
bight? Some people advocate tying in
directly to the harness with a bowline or re-threaded overhand
or 8 on a bight, and not using a locking carabiner. If you are
desperately short on locking carabiners, I can see the point.
Otherwise, I'd say the greater complication in tying, of
getting in and out, the bulk of the knot and the amount of
rope you have to use, make this undesirable compared to the
carabiners/8 on a bight combination. The pair of carabiners,
if locked, reversed and opposed, is not going to break under
normal conceivable glacier travel circumstances. Some people prefer a butterfly knot
for this purpose, as it's cleaner looking when pulled apart,
as could happen in a crevasse fall scenario. Personally, I'm
not convinced it's worth learning this rather tricky knot for
this reason. Most often the rope is weighted only on one side
of the knot, so the force on the knot is the same as usual.
Even if there is a load pulling two directions on the knot, I
don't know for sure if the butterfly is stronger than the
figure 8 or by how much, but I do know that the figure 8 is
strong enough! It may deform, but it's still relatively easy
to untie after loading. There is one purpose for which the
butterfly is definitely much better suited than the figure 8
on the bight, or the overhand on a bight, and that is for
tying "stopper" knots into the rope. This means tying a knot
in the rope between climbers every few feet, to add friction
as the rope cuts through the snow in the case of a crevasse
fall, and make it easier to arrest and stop the victim falling
any further in than necessary. This is most often done when
only two people are on the rope, especially if one person
significantly outweighs the other, or if either are weak at
self arrest. The butterfly has strands running along the
bottom of the knot against the snow, which increase its
friction and braking power. The 8 and overhand are less
desirable here for the same reason they are most desirable in
joining rappel ropes: they present a flat aspect to the
surface and skate along rather than jamming or dragging. These
are just some of the knotty questions (sorry) we seem to often
debate endlessly about. Such often esoteric seeming arguments
can be pretty entertaining. My position though is that if you
don't have a pretty clear reason to prefer one knot to
another, then there's no point in arguing! And you can
probably drop one of them out of your repertoire too, if
you're knot challenged. If you do have a reason, and it's a
good one, you win the argument! I would love to hear from any of
you who have a pet knot controversy going, or who have a
contrasting view of any of this stuff. - Kathy More suggestions? Different views?
E-mail
MW.
.
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