Gear belay in "ground crack."

New person question - if you detest new folks please move on. So I am venturing into trad and have been working on building lots of gear anchors this winter out at my local crag (not climbing/belaying on them, just practicing) I keep "Climbing Anchors" next to my bed (love it) and feel confident today with the equalette, cordelette, quad, sliding X etc. Purchased a decent rack and practice placing pro often, but one situation escapes me that I have not been able to find info on:

Let's say you lead up and top out a single pitch route and want to build a gear anchor to belay your partner up, but it's flat up there and there are no trees, vertical/horizontal cracks within reach or any other natural features save a few good solid cracks in the flat rock under your feet, maybe 10-15 feet back from the edge. If I were to place pro in the cracks, there would be no way to orient the pro so that it could handle the proper direction of pull right? In a direct belay situation, holding a fall off an anchor in ground cracks would want to pull my anchor towards the ground as I imagine it, maybe pulling the pro or at least causing the rope to hang over the edge with a lot of force. Best thing I can think in this situation is to place cams so that they can flex with the direction of pull, but what if I used all my cams up? What then?

If pressed for a camless solution, I think I would build my anchor out of my hexes (DMM torque nuts so they have the nice extendable slings) or tricams. And rather than belay with my Gri-Gri directly off the anchor, go indirect to take as much load off the anchor as possible. I imagine I would extend from the anchor with the climbing rope to the edge and clip myself in there with a clove or 8 while hanging my legs over the edge (because the anchor is low if my partner falls I'm going to get pulled in line with it) and then belay indirectly off my tie-in loop at the edge while sitting.

Does this dog hunt? What are your solutions for anchoring off of ground cracks? Thanks all.

Throw a few solid pieces into the cracks, clove into those pieces (serial clove hitches are fine if the gear is solid) with just enough slack to get back to the edge. Position yourself with legs dangling over the edge, tight on your anchor. Belay directly off your harness.

As long as the cracks aren't too shallow, you can place gear pretty much exactly in the direction of load in this scenario.

If you only have passive gear left, try to find some constrictions in the crack that will take an upward force. Slot your hexes/nuts behind and under those constrictions.

Worst case scenario, there are no good cracks for gear (rare) or you have no gear left that fits (also rare). Tag up some extra gear if you can. If not, find a solid stance (lip, dish to sit in, something to prop your feet against, etc), belay off your harness.

tv.thebmc.co.uk/video/how-t…

all leaders on multi should be proficient on belaying straight off the harness for this reason ...

;)

You set it up the same way as if it was a vertical wall in front of you.
Providing its a seconding situation an the edge isn't razor sharp you can also belay directly from the belay on the ground. Not for a TR case where there is a lot of up and down.
The cracks running parallel to the cliff band treat as horizontal and the perpendicular ones treat as vertical.
Then you always position the ear in the direction of pull. In this case where the rope goes over the edge.

Now lets say the there is a nice vertical face 30 feet back from the cliffs edge and you build a anchor 5 feet of the up. In the vertical cracks the gear need to point in the direction of pull. This is NOT straight down but at a 76° angle out from the rock band. Pointing straight to where the rope goes over the edge.

Mike Marmar wrote:Worst case scenario, there are no good cracks for gear (rare) or you have no gear left that fits (also rare). Tag up some extra gear if you can. If not, find a solid stance (lip, dish to sit in, something to prop your feet against, etc), belay off your harness.

wouldn't it be better to just downclimb/lower back down and use a redirect or direct belay? i would think you would be able to get in an extra piece or two where you put in your last piece. i'd rather do that than belay from a stance

Yeah that might work too. It's not really a situation that happens very often (has happened to me maybe twice, and only when I have gotten off-route/missed the belay on a multi-pitch). Just use your head.

If the "ground cracks" are 10-15 ft back from the edge, I don't see any real problem with that. You can either belay directly off your anchor (though this would cause some rope drag over the edge, and beware sharp edges!) or belay off your harness. Where it gets tricky is when there's nothing up top at all.

Should you elect to belay off the harness, make sure your connection to the anchor is tight, and either sit, or be prepared to take the full force of your second's fall in whatever standing position you choose (which should be SOLID). Probably the greatest risk is being pulled off your feet and losing control of the belay.

Know that the direction of pull on the rope will be in a downward direction, as opposed to the usual upward pull from "normal" belays. It can cause you to lose balance, and if you run the climber's side of the rope over any body parts, you can get rope burns and a considerable amount of discomfort when your second flails.

Good stuff all, I really appreciate the feedback available here on MP. Yes, maybe lowering off may be a simpler solution in this scenario, but I feel more confident about this kind of anchor hearing the other feedback, too. I am going to be climbing mostly single pitches this year with the idea that sooner or later my partner and I will be on multi-pitch routes, so that's another reason I had this question. Thanks again and happy climbing!

Matt

good for you for being pro-active rather than reactive. i would suggest, on days when you have ample time, practicing gear anchors and top belaying with various systems and start aiming to be very time efficient. you could have your 2nd time you from the time you yell off belay to the time you yell on belay. i say this because i made the mistake of not doing this and my first couple of multi-pitch climbs took wayyy more time than they should have. in many cases, speed is safety.

Matthew Williams 1 wrote:Good stuff all, I really appreciate the feedback available here on MP. Yes, maybe lowering off may be a simpler solution in this scenario, but I feel more confident about this kind of anchor hearing the other feedback, too. I am going to be climbing mostly single pitches this year with the idea that sooner or later my partner and I will be on multi-pitch routes, so that's another reason I had this question. Thanks again and happy climbing! Matt

No this is the exact scenario where you don't want to lower off.
Just build the anchor as you would on a vert face except it's on the ground. Try it. It's easier to see how it works when you are there.

The flat top that the OP describes is very common at the Peterskill area of the Gunks (photo). But the pitches are short and the leader usually has enough rope to walk back to a solid tree. But there are several spots where a "crack in the floor" works just fine for a gear anchor.

So I survived my first leads this weekend, leading both the Beginner's Crack and since we were there we also climbed the two-pitch "Pedastal" (5.6) at the West Face, summit area of Old Rag this weekend. Thanks again for your advice on the "ground crack" - I've attached a picture of the anchor I built in it if that might be useful to any other trad noobs out there. I extended from the power point to the cliff edge with the climbing rope and tied off there so I could see over the edge - worked great. Have a good one!

Is that laid rope or does the pattern just make it look that way?

I have definitely belayed right off such an anchor, as long as the edge of the cliff doesn't seem too sharp for the rope. You can attach a Gri Gri or ATC Guide to the master point, but then extend your own anchor so that you're at the edge of the cliff watching your second, but the belay device is 10 feet away at the cracks. Still perfectly easy to take up slack, as long as you've got a grip on both ends of the rope coming from the belay device.

Kiri Namtvedt wrote: You can attach a Gri Gri or ATC Guide to the master point, but then extend your own anchor so that you're at the edge of the cliff watching your second, but the belay device is 10 feet away at the cracks.

I'm having a hard time visualizing how you would lower the climber in this situation. If you are overlooking your climber at the edge with the belay device 10-15' away from you are you going back to the master point to lower if necessary? This seems to be an inefficient way to belay from the top.

Matthew Williams 1,

Congratulations on your leads and it appears you didn't die!

I understand what you have going on in your picture, but I believe you can make your anchor a bit more neat/tidy while also keeping any extension of your anchor at a minimum. With that, your anchor looks sound, depending on the hidden protection placements.

The picture below was taken this last Thursday by my daughther, who incidentally, built the anchor. She is 12. This is a very simple, very adjustable anchor system with little to no extension, plenty of redundancy, and a nice shelf.



For your scenario, I would adjust master point so that I'm in a position to belay off of my harness while attached to the anchor and in contact (eye, ear, or feel) of my climber.

BigFeet wrote: I'm having a hard time visualizing how you would lower the climber in this situation. If you are overlooking your climber at the edge with the belay device 10-15' away from you are you going back to the master point to lower if necessary? This seems to be an inefficient way to belay from the top.

Depends how frequently you need to lower your climber. With no fixed anchors you're probably going to need to walk off anyways, so unless there's some tricky traverse or overhang where you expect your follower to fall and need lowered to get back on the rock, I think the system works fine. I've used it a couple times in certain scenarios.

Treat the cracks in the horizontal surface just like you would cracks in a vertical climb.

The "direction of fall" will be towards the cliff edge, of course.

So, if the crack is running "vertical" that is, to/from the edge of the cliff -- protect just like you would for any vertical cliff, including nuts (in constrictions), cams, etc.

If the crack is "horizonatl", that is, parallel to the edge of the cliff, then protect as you would in a horizontal crack. Here is a place where tri-cams completely shine. They are about the best choices for horizontal cracks, with the main weakness that they can be a bit fiddly to place -- so you want a good stance while placing (and cleaning) -- the top of the cliff is a perfect stance. (And carrying a few tri-cams up for the anchor is generally lighter than carrying a few spare cams up.)

And, if the crack is diagonal... well...

Yes, my concept of having the belay device 10 feet away from you does assume you won't be lowering. If I was expecting that I might have to lower the climber I would handle it differently.

Kiri Namtvedt wrote:Yes, my concept of having the belay device 10 feet away from you does assume you won't be lowering. If I was expecting that I might have to lower the climber I would handle it differently.

This makes sense. I was wondering if I had missed something in the technique.

Like others have said, treat it like you would with a horizontal crack. You could try using opposed stoppers (discussed here on MP and here in Climbing mag).

One more thing to be aware of when setting an anchor like this is to make sure your pro doesn't drop down into the crack if the crack flares. This was an issue at the area where I learned to set trad anchors. I see it as mostly a concern for passive pro, although cams can walk too.

Obviously this principle applies for all gear placements, but the difference I see is that in cracks on vertical terrain (regardless of whether the crack is horizontal or vertical), gravity is helping your pro stay seated in position and oriented towards the direction of pull -- typically, your biggest concern for having your pro pop out of place is if the rope knocks it out as you move past. However, when setting pro in a crack on a horizontal plane as in your situation, gravity is working against you to pull your pro out place (i.e., deeper into the crack). A little bit of jostling on the anchor (like hauling up your second) can be enough to unseat your pro out of the nice constriction you found and drop it into the crack.

Just be sure to give your passive pro placements a good yank and set them well, and you should be fine.

Congrats on moving into trad. Stay safe.

I find this situation is a pretty good place for tricams (it is basically a textbook horizontal crack). The sling will rub nicely agains the rock in the direction of pull and won't flex a stem. Also you have the advantage of being on hand to remove them after your buddy gets up; always so much easier to remove your own tricam placements than having your second get them.