Petzl Conga 8mm for Anchors?

A friend gave me this rope the other day and I thought I could use it for building anchors (mostly TR) since it's described as "semi-static cord" (I think around a 4% elongation). But... I was just on the Petzl site and it said:

Warning: Do not use for fall arrest, for example in climbing or mountaineering.
Rope type: (CE EN 564, UIAA): cord
Tensile strength: 15 kN

That first bit gave me pause, but I'm not sure it's warranted. Although it's described as "8 mm diameter cord for installing a handline when on a hike", the manual shows a user rapelling* from it and says it shouldn't be used for belaying. Does it just mean not to use it as your climbing rope, or not to use it in climbing whatsoever? The whole "hiking", "Do not use for... climbing" bits are weirding me out.

Any thoughts? I'm leaning towards thinking it's fine to use in anchor construction.

I would take that warning literally as stated. Do not use that rope for fall-arrest.

Rappelling is not fall arrest. A hand-line for hiking is not fall-arrest.

Yes, it could be used for building anchors -- then you have a dynamic rope in the system for fall arrest.

Sounds fine to me, to me it sounds like they're purely suggesting that it cannot take lead falls safely (i.e. the catch will be very sharp and many things will be unhappy: the rope, your body, the gear, and the belayer). Not a proper dynamic rope.

gavinsmith wrote:Sounds fine to me, to me it sounds like they're purely suggesting that it cannot take lead falls safely (i.e. the catch will be very sharp and many things will be unhappy: the rope, your body, the gear, and the belayer). Not a proper dynamic rope.

8mm cord is standard, and beefy. Most people use 7mm cord for anchor building, however, 8mm cord is on the thin end to be used as a static rope for long TR setups. This mostly has to do with abrasion over sharp edges. I use 7/8mm cord around trees, on bolts and on gear anchors, but I do not use it over edges when creating big anchors using trees or other points. Again the main concern is abrasion.

As people mentioned 8mm cord is not fall arresting, meaning it's not dynamic cord and will hurt significantly if used to catch falls, but it's plenary strong.

Thanks for the help everyone.

I am actually planning on using this for long (and shorter) TR setups. I thought it would be good for that since it's 30m. I do pad the lip when needed (read: vast majority of the time) and the distances to trees used for anchors aren't more than 20 feet or so.

If anyone's wondering, I've normally either used webbing (because it's cheap and I had it) or my friend's super-beefy rope (gotta be at least 10mm, feels like 15mm, lol).

Again, thanks for the help. :)

Reviving this thread, wondering how this rope would perform in glacier travel / crevasse rescue . Where it might be used to arrest a fall, but not a fall that would generally create a lot of force. Comparing it to petzl rad line, I can't see a whole lot of difference, except price. It's rated to 15 kn, pretty strong. 

Ira OMC wrote:

Reviving this thread, wondering how this rope would perform in glacier travel / crevasse rescue . Where it might be used to arrest a fall, but not a fall that would generally create a lot of force. Comparing it to petzl rad line, I can't see a whole lot of difference, except price. It's rated to 15 kn, pretty strong. 

Statics are great for glacier travel— your partner self arresting absorbs the force of the fall, not the rope. Pulley systems for rescue are more efficient with a static.

The only glacier travel situation I’d be cautious with a static would be belaying off an anchor to cross a suspect snow bridge, which can be mitigated with a meat energy absorber.

Rad line is more expensive because it’s light.

Ira OMC wrote:

Reviving this thread, wondering how this rope would perform in glacier travel / crevasse rescue . Where it might be used to arrest a fall, but not a fall that would generally create a lot of force. Comparing it to petzl rad line, I can't see a whole lot of difference, except price. It's rated to 15 kn, pretty strong. 

Far as I can tell the Conga isn’t dry treated. Hard pass for use on a glacier. 

Ah, good point Matt !