What are these?

I saw something similar to these in Poudre Canyon but looked pretty old

M Sprague wrote: I found where Dave mentioned them on the Team Tough site

Yeah, that's the post I saw.

Hmm....there are rams-horns at the top of almost every route here in Badami, India. Haven't heard of any accident yet and I've rappelled off these innumerable times. A rope escaping the pigtail or ramshorn during a rappel just seems so improbable but then the videos GroeWaz linked show otherwise.

Most of the routes here were put up by French climbers, Alexandre Chabot et al but I couldn't find any documentation to refer to. I started this topic because the current generation of climbers (including me), who want to put up new routes here, didn't know what these were. We just called them 'rappel buckets' :) but didn't know what to search for online to buy these. Even a search for rappel anchors does not bring up pigtails and ramshorns.

So if these are indeed not very safe and if one wanted anchors which do not need the climber to untie from the rope, would a super-shut work better?

The Monster hooks on Jim's site look interesting too

Hmm, a demonstration of how "easy" it is to get the rope out when it isn´t correctly installed to start with is a bit curious.....
The one shown was probably made by the i.g. Klettern which is a German sport climbers association,an older Salewa one installed in an AustriAlpin bolt or maybe AA´s original ones, they all look about the same really. Might even be mine!

Curiously when the UIAA wanted to introduce a standard for lower-offs the test was to tie a loop of cord in and then attempt to remove it by flicking and moving the cord, the example they used as an acceptable design was exactly this type of ramshorn.

We have stopped making Monster Hooks, they proved too much of a challenge to use for many climbers and they are expensive to make.

GroeWaZ wrote:See videos (sorry I could only find them on FB): facebook.com/photo.php?v=67… facebook.com/video.php?v=67… Google translate of the report here: translate.google.com/transl…

Crisco Jackass wrote: Mountaineering groups in the Alps have recently panned these "pigtails" for rappelling in their journal "bergundsteigen" as prone to unclipping. Actual piece is in German and Google translate butchers it, but this version is fairly readable.

Rope is only clipped to one side of the pigtails in both the Youtube Video and in the google translated link posted by Crisco. Isn't this a case of incorrect use of the equipment, rather than the equipment fail? In the video, they had to flick the rope until the "tail" of the pigtails was pointing away from the rock, then apply a sideward force in order to get the rope out of the pigtail.

I'd like to see them do a test with both side of the pigtails clipped. I think it would be highly unlikely they can produce the same failure.



Ram horn test

I can unclipped a carabiner by doing the same thing.

They are lower offs. Not climb above, do 3 summersaults, twist sideways, and pulls.

Curious where the NH crew is sourcing them
From? Direct from Jim or a US distributor. Running the numbers these are a better value than my current Mussy setup with all the damn QLs but my order size would make it cost prohibitive to ship from Germany I suspect

Those videos show some very interesting rappel conditions.

mattm wrote:Curious where the NH crew is sourcing them From? Direct from Jim or a US distributor. Running the numbers these are a better value than my current Mussy setup with all the damn QLs but my order size would make it cost prohibitive to ship from Germany I suspect

Direct.
We don´t really sell the 12mm ones any more as we need to re-tool for them and they aren´t really such a good deal for the customer when you look at the lifespan for the dollar.
The price quoted somewhere above is not the US cost, it includes the European tax of 19% which is removed for export. A 10mm 316 stainless ramshorn costs a US customer €7.90 which is $8.86 with the miserable value of the Euro at the moment. The freight on around 20 of the things works out at $2.00 each.
The Rumney Climbers Association get a discounted price as do all bolt funds and were carried as luggage back to the USA to reduce the cost.

Nice! Once I see how Dave and Chris are configuring them I may be getting some to try on single pitch routes elsewhere.