Wireless headset/microphone for climber/belayer communication

My boyfriend has a quiet voice and both of us end up frustrated that I can't hear him while I am belaying him- particularly when he's working a difficult sport route and wants me to take up and give slack, and take up, and give slack, and take up, and take up a little more....you get the picture....

I've of course asked him to speak up, without much success....

We have a somewhat successful hand signal system. But man, it sure would be nice if there we some sort of microphone/headphone based system.

Ideally, it would be a wireless (non-cell phone based) system so that it will work at crags without signal.

Does anyone actually do this with any success?

And does anyone have a recommendation for something that might work?

A new boyfriend?

R. Moran wrote:A new boyfriend?

+1 You can do better.

walkie talkies with a headphone/mic setup, but you would still have to press the push to talk button.

Voice activated radios. Or perhaps intercom like motorcyclists use.

My ancient Motorola Talk Abouts came with headsets and a vox feature that would attempt to open the radio channel anytime it heard your voice.

I never used it for climbing, but the vox feature did work for hands-free comms, more or less.

I'd imagine such technology is better today (mine are at least 15 years old).

There is a blind kayaker who is receiving information on the river from a partner, which I believe is through a wireless headset. I don't have specifics but it is a lead to follow. A kayaking forum may lead you in the right direction.

My wife and I have had the same troubles, over a ledge, windy, can't see each other, can't hear each other. We tried radios and they were cumbersome, and the headset microphones we tried did not cancel out wind noise.

So tried something different. Motorcycle blue tooth intercoms. After a little research we settled on the UClear system. We also purchased extra earphone/microphone for our motorcycle helmets.

The initial installation/use wasn't real good, then I reinstalled them in our climbing helmets, paying more attention to proper installation.

Now they are crystal clear up to about 1/2 mile and wind less than 40mph. They are line of sight dependent, if you partner goes over a ledge reception drops, we can still hear when out of sight of each other, but the further out of sight we get the less reception. One downside is that if you are out of sight/reception for more than about a minute the units will de-sync. Then you have to be within good reception and manually hold down the sync button to get them to re-sync.

I now have them installed permanently on our climbing helmets, motorcycle helmets, ski helmets, and mountain bike helmets. They have been wonderful, no more yelling at each other. No more confused commands on crowded crags. We can talk normally and hear each other fine, even when it's windy.

Not being sure that we were going to be successful with them I purchased them through REI, paid a bit more, but could have returned them if they didn't work out.

Here is the REI link.

REI Uclear Blue Tooth

I noticed that they are on sale, that's the best price I have seen for them.

Jen, have you tried some sort of belay glasses? I find them very helpful when belaying long hangdog sessions. You can usually see and anticipate what the climber does and act accordingly (especially clipping).

JenHazen wrote:My boyfriend has a quiet voice and both of us end up frustrated that I can't hear him while I am belaying him- particularly when he's working a difficult sport route and wants me to take up and give slack, and take up, and give slack, and take up, and take up a little more....you get the picture.... I've of course asked him to speak up, without much success....

Just leave a enough slack so the rope touches the ground and ignore him, talk to some hunky guy, text your friends or whatever instead of listening to a cowards incessant whining. Shout "allez" occasionally to keep his hopes up. This is the continental approach.

JenHazen wrote:And does anyone have a recommendation for something that might work?

Voice coach. Your boyfriend perhaps didn't learn to project at a young age or is perhaps very shy - both can result in a "quiet voice". Don't buy any electronic thingys that will just clutter your crag life. It's also a skill he'll need if he ever climbs with anyone else.

He's ruled out any possible physiological causes by seeing a doctor, yes?

We both have "camera on a stick" but we can also use ours to talk!! POW

CJC wrote: they need to be tethered to BT on a phone.

The ones I have don't have to tethered to a phone. They link to each other for intercom. You can link them to a phone for music or incoming calls.

This is a brilliant idea!

Learn a simple rope pull system to communicate on/off belay. While it won't help you with his soft voice if you're trying to share beta, it will help you communicate the important stuff if you can't hear each other.

Are you guys joking?

jacob sidorin wrote:Are you guys joking?

The OP or the responses?
There's strong evidence for both!
And I don't remember if anyone mentioned it, but to the boyfriend with a soft voice in the OP - harden the fuck up!

youtube.com/watch?v=unkIVvj…

JenHazen wrote:My boyfriend has a quiet voice and both of us end up frustrated that I can't hear him while I am belaying him- particularly when he's working a difficult sport route and wants me to take up and give slack, and take up, and give slack, and take up, and take up a little more....

Hi Jen,

Seems like folks are being silly and you deserve a serious answer.

The bottom line is that you two are violating one of the bedrock basics of safe belaying:

Communicate CLEARLY using standard belay commands!


There is a real reason that new climbers are taught to ALWAYS use the standard commands, i.e. belay on?! on belay!, etc. Edit (as if it isn't obvious, but whatever...) AND make sure you are understood clearly.

Your boyfriend is being an idiot by refusing to use safe standard practices by clearly communicating with you using standard commands.

You are being an idiot by allowing him to do this.

Put another way there is a good chance of him being dropped, especially with an anchor transition/descending scenario, but it is also quite possible he will eventually drop who he is belaying by being too stoopid to communicate clearly. NONE of my partners would put up with this. It is unsafe.

So bottom line is just get him to do the right thing. Or climb with somebody else.

coldfinger wrote: Hi Jen, Seems like folks are being silly and you deserve a serious answer. The bottom line is that you two are violating one of the bedrock basics of safe belaying: Communicate clearly using standard belay commands! There is a real reason that new climbers are taught to ALWAYS use the standard commands, i.e. belay on?! on belay!, etc. Your boyfriend is being an idiot by refusing to use safe standard practices by clearly communicating with you using standard commands. You are being an idiot by allowing him to do this. Put another way there is a good chance of him being dropped, especially with an anchor transition/descending scenario, but it is also quite possible he will eventually drop who he is belaying by being too stoopid to communicate clearly. NONE of my partners would put up with this. It is unsafe. So bottom line is just get him to do the right thing. Or climb with somebody else.

You might want to reread the OP - she never said anything about non-standard commands; just that wimpy BF can't manage to yell loudly enough.
Personally I think it's a bunch of BS.

You might want to reread mine....

You have to communicate CLEARLY!

coldfinger wrote:You might want to reread mine.... You have to communicate CLEARLY!

Which can indeed be done with hand signals. Or in a different language. Or a variety of other ways.