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Racking screws on a harness that doesnt take ice clips?

Original Post
Josh Allred · · Salt Lake City, UT · Joined Mar 2011 · Points: 161

Any suggestions? Ive seen it done different ways. I am not a fan of attaching ice clips with the plastic piece.

sarcasm · · Unknown Hometown · Joined May 2010 · Points: 445

petzl spirit bent gates. two of them, facilitate upwards of 8 screws or so between them. work great. key lock won't snag the hangers on the screws. love em.

Forthright · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Oct 2011 · Points: 110
mtoensing · · AZ · Joined Feb 2006 · Points: 705

I never really used those clippers things. I thought it was a huge waste of $scrilla$ to essentially just buy a cheap plastic carabiner. Just get 2 or 3 large ovals for your screws.

Cor · · Sandbagging since 1989 · Joined Mar 2006 · Points: 1,445

+1 on the spirit bent gates.

When I had a harness that did not have a sewn slot to hold the biners firmly, here is what I did.

Take the rubber that comes with an ice clipper, or maybe one of those rubber parts that goes on sport draws, or maybe a strong/small rubber band.

Use one of these to hold the biner tight to the gear loop. Basically thread the rubber through the biner, clip the biner to loop, then finish threading the rubber back to biner.

Now you have a biner that is hanging from the gear loop, gate facing out, and it is stuck in that position. no flopping around...

hope that helps, it worked well for me, and was easy to get screws off, and back on the setup.

Cheers.

Brian in SLC · · Sandy, Utah · Joined Oct 2003 · Points: 21,711

I've used these yellow rigs for years:

carabiner ice screw carrier

Can't recall who made them (dead bird?) but I think I got them from MEC. Anyone know?

Mtn Ape XL · · Utah · Joined Apr 2010 · Points: 131

Correctly identified as made by Arcteryx...a pair used to come with one of their ice-specific harness years ago and was sold as a separate accessory for awhile...

BigM · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jan 2011 · Points: 0

This works really well!
frozentime.se/climbing/icec…

Gunkiemike · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jul 2009 · Points: 3,492
Cor wrote:+1 on the spirit bent gates. When I had a harness that did not have a sewn slot to hold the biners firmly, here is what I did. Take the rubber that comes with an ice clipper, or maybe one of those rubber parts that goes on sport draws, or maybe a strong/small rubber band. Use one of these to hold the biner tight to the gear loop. Basically thread the rubber through the biner, clip the biner to loop, then finish threading the rubber back to biner.
I use the heavy rubber bands that come on broccoli and asparagus. I use two for redundancy and secure the biner (a large wiregate, unspecified model from Wild Country) directly to the waist loop of my harness rather than the gear loops.
DannyUncanny · · Vancouver · Joined Aug 2010 · Points: 100
Gunkiemike wrote: I use the heavy rubber bands that come on broccoli and asparagus. I use two for redundancy and secure the biner (a large wiregate, unspecified model from Wild Country) directly to the waist loop of my harness rather than the gear loops.
Is the biner actually clipped to anything if those elastic bands break?
Will S · · Joshua Tree · Joined Nov 2006 · Points: 1,061

I've got a couple of giant old bent gate biners that are fat enough to have clip all the way around the waist belt of a harness. You can get about half a dozen screws on it no problem. This thing was from probably the mid 1990s when the "big basket" craze of rope-end biners reached it's crescendo.

Probably still sitting in the box of ice gear in my garage. Why I haven't sold that crap since I moved to SoCal many years ago is a mystery.

Gunkiemike · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jul 2009 · Points: 3,492
DannyUncanny wrote: Is the biner actually clipped to anything if those elastic bands break?
Sometimes. If I worry about it, as I always did when I used the rubber pieces from the BD ice clippers, then I back things up with a small loop of 2mm cord. I don't think the current crop of asparagus-banded biners are backed up though. nb- I check the rubber bands OFTEN.
Sunny-D · · SLC, Utah · Joined Aug 2006 · Points: 700
Brian in SLC wrote:I've used these yellow rigs for years: Can't recall who made them (dead bird?) but I think I got them from MEC. Anyone know?
Brian,
Where did you get those biners... They are perfect... I didn't realize BD made a wire gate version. (I forget what the biner is called) I have the bent solid gate version and they are awesome I can only imagine how well the wire gate version works...
Dallen
Sunny-D · · SLC, Utah · Joined Aug 2006 · Points: 700

Just Remembered Fins? Right...

JohnnyG · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Nov 2009 · Points: 10

I use the plastic piece. ;-)

I have backed it with electrical tape. Holds all season.

I've climbed through some tight squeeze chimneys where the clipper got a little mangled, but the set up held.

Jon H · · PC, UT · Joined Nov 2009 · Points: 118
Sunny-D wrote:Just Remembered Fins? Right...
Yup, the BD Fin. I read that Carlos Buhler had broken one of them in a short, clean, low FF fall and they were then summarily discontinued. I subsequently spoke to a long time BD employee who said they were simply the very first hot forged biner and "discontinued" only because they made rapid improvements in the technology, not because of any failures or inadequacies, but I digress. They certainly are the PERFECT screw racking biner. I've got 4 of them that I use specifically for that purpose. Interestingly, I had never seen them in a wiregate until now, either. They were designed by Andrew McLean (original designer of the Camalot!) and he has pictures of them in silver and black solid gates on his website, but no image of a wiregate.

This is the rig I've set up to rack screws:



It's nothing more than 2 biners connected by plastic tubing (I used PEX, but anything will do) and zip ties. I went to this method after breaking a plastic ice clipper on a descent and losing a Cobra and 3 screws on the 3rd of 6 rappels. As an added bonus, now I have 4 extra full strength biners (I carry one doohickey on each side) in case I ever need them at only a ~40 gram penalty.

This is how it hangs on the harness:



The rigidity of the "backing" created by the plastic tubing makes it remarkably easy to pop screws in and out, way easier than even the plastic clippers by a long shot. The best readily available biner today for this purpose is probably the BD Hotwire.

It's essentially a DIY version of Simond's $45 aluminum ice clipper that still has the disadvantage of being for racking only, not full strength.

Brian in SLC · · Sandy, Utah · Joined Oct 2003 · Points: 21,711
Sunny-D wrote: Brian, Where did you get those biners... They are perfect... I didn't realize BD made a wire gate version.
Yep, Fins. They, uhh, never commecially produced a wiregate version...nice for racking screws and they come off super fast.

I used standard Fins on the rope end of most of my screamers. Rope just jumps in, especially twins. Huge gate.
Brian in SLC · · Sandy, Utah · Joined Oct 2003 · Points: 21,711
Jon H wrote: The best readily available biner today for this purpose is probably the BD Hotwire. It's essentially a DIY version of Simond's $45 aluminum ice clipper that still has the disadvantage of being for racking only, not full strength.
That's a really cool looking homemade racking rig!

DMM made a really large bent gate biner for awhile too. Nearly the size of a Fin. That'd work, but, I see on their website that they may be discontinued as well.
Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

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