Does anyone use unrated carabiners for racking?

The other people you're climbing with may not know, or have trouble recognizing, that they're not rated for strength.

My friend has a Black Diamond "biner" that looks just like a neutrino, it was hard to believe that a company that makes the real thing pays some factory in China to print their name on a keychain replica.

I guess you’re hoping that someone will come up with one good reason to do it that will trump the numerous reasons to not do it?

I actually 3d print all my climbing gear. 

Alex R wrote:
You and I have different definitions of vitriolic.

Definition.  Vitriolic. "filled with bitter criticism or malice."

now, someone saying that "if anyone says yes to this they should get stoned" is not bitter or malicious.  it's actually looking out for your livelihood by staving off boneheaded advice from the average internet contrarian.

you asked a question with an obvious answer.

the risk assessment is now in your own hands again.  what more really need be said??

Nate Tastic wrote: This post violated Guideline #100.95884732 of the MP penal code and has been removed.

If you keep having posts removed for violating the only rule on MP, perhaps the rule isn't the problem.

To answer the thread title, yes, someone does, this guy:
https://www.mountainproject.com/forum/topic/114187473/is-this-a-rated-biner

tape velcro to each piece and wear a velcro vest

on a side note, velcro gloves really keep those sheep from slipping from your grip

oh, and that's a really dumb question. 

cdawg lion wrote: light weight alpine draw. a sling and 1 biner. over your head and shoulder. you'll still need a few regular draws for your nuts if you got any...

This! Rack your cams on nanos, have a few alpine draws for nuts, and carry quite a few slings with a single biner over your shoulder to extend your cams and sling trees and spikes etc... this is of course only useful for remote alpine climbs where you climb well below your limit. 

dave custer wrote: You have it backwards: you need to replace your heavy accessory carabiners (27 grams ( blackdiamondequipment.com/e…)) with fully certified Edelrid 19G (19 grams) or CAMP nano (22 grams) carabiners.

This.

I picked up a handful of the Edelrid 19G biners on sale last year to check out.  I don't like them for clipping the rope as I have pretty big hands and the biners feel small when trying to handle with the rope, but I really like them for the gear side of alpine draws.  I'm definitely keeping my eyes out for them on-sale again to use as racking biners, too.  Because of their size, the only thing I don't think they would work well for is racking nuts/stoppers/etc

I'm fan of full strength everything; Prevents mistakes made by me or my partner from happening and killing somebody. Lightweight full strength are an option and also more durable than chinesium not-for-climbing biners,

Even my ice clippers are the Grivel ones: aluminum and full strength. Although that also has to do with failing plastic ice clippers and raining down icescrews.

bkozak wrote: https://www.camp-usa.com/outdoor/product/carabiners/nano-22-carabiner/

No excuse for utility carabiners.

Nano 22s are sweet.   You can even get crazier and get edelrid 19s, but the nanos are much nicer for actual clipping.  

Nick B wrote:

Nano 22s are sweet.   You can even get crazier and get edelrid 19s, but the nanos are much nicer for actual clipping.  

I got Nanos for my racking 'biners, color-coding seemed like a good idea, and lightweight, and all... Except i don't really like clipping them. Didn't think it would be an issue, having smaller hands, but they aren't my favorites. If I were to do it over, I wouldn't.

Lena chita wrote:

I got Nanos for my racking 'biners, color-coding seemed like a good idea, and lightweight, and all... Except i don't really like clipping them. Didn't think it would be an issue, having smaller hands, but they aren't my favorites. If I were to do it over, I wouldn't.

It's funny how that works.  I have medium/large hands and love them. 

Lena chita wrote:

I got Nanos for my racking 'biners, color-coding seemed like a good idea, and lightweight, and all... Except i don't really like clipping them. Didn't think it would be an issue, having smaller hands, but they aren't my favorites. If I were to do it over, I wouldn't.

I have a mix of Nanos and Photons as my racking biners. I have to say that I think the Photons are worth the extra 5 grams each. 

Alex R wrote: I kind of figured their would be a bunch of knee jerk responses like this. Maybe it wasn't worth asking the question, it now seems unlikely that there will be anything interesting said, and if there is it will be drowned out by a million voices stating the obvious.

I also just remembered that many climbing brands actually already produce unrated (plastic even) carabiners for the purpose or racking gear, it just happens to be ice screws instead of nuts and cams. What makes this an acceptable practice in ice climbing, but so taboo for rock climbing as to garner such a vitriolic response?

I use keyhole type krabs for racking single wires individually on a bandolier. I used to use only rated krabs and still like all my gear to be as multifunctional as possible. However I started to fumble with krabs with several wires and was at risk of dropping some. My solution was to use these really light krabs.
I don't think there is really any risk of using for them for weight bearing as they never leave my bandolier and would only fit a rope with difficulty.
I should add that I am now only a low grade climber and have a small rack by modern standards.

Lena chita wrote:

I got Nanos for my racking 'biners, color-coding seemed like a good idea, and lightweight, and all... Except i don't really like clipping them. Didn't think it would be an issue, having smaller hands, but they aren't my favorites. If I were to do it over, I wouldn't.

My racking biners are a mix of photons, nanos, and a few neutrinos here and there. I haven't really had an issue with them as racking biners because I rarely clip directly into the racking biner because I'm almost always adding a draw or runner. That being said, when I have clipped the rope to them, I haven't really had much of an issue.

This is probably because my first set of quickdraws ever were trango phases, so I was clipping smallish biners from the start. Or it could also be the way that I clip, because most of my climbing partners say I clip weird.

Even if you don't like clipping them, they're still great to save weight on bolt/gear side biners where you don't really need to care about ease of clipping or durability of rope-bearing surfaces. 

eli poss wrote:

My racking biners are a mix of photons, nanos, and a few neutrinos here and there. I haven't really had an issue with them as racking biners because I rarely clip directly into the racking biner because I'm almost always adding a draw or runner. That being said, when I have clipped the rope to them, I haven't really had much of an issue.

This is probably because my first set of quickdraws ever were trango phases, so I was clipping smallish biners from the start. Or it could also be the way that I clip, because most of my climbing partners say I clip weird.

Even if you don't like clipping them, they're still great to save weight on bolt/gear side biners where you don't really need to care about ease of clipping or durability of rope-bearing surfaces. 

Oh yeah, no argument from me. I don't strongly hate them, so I'm in no rush to replace perfectly fine nano 'biners with different ones, just because I don't like clipping them. It's not like my trad climbing is at the level where extra half-second of clipping anything other than my preferred and perfectly-shaped 'biner would make a difference. But couple ounces of weight also don't make that much difference to me in the context of occasional single-pitch trad climbing, so when I do get more 'biners, nanos probably won't be it.

Nate Tastic wrote: Why's that?

Rope drag. The local trad climbing area here doesn't have a ton of perfectly straight splitter cracks, and most of them are hard finger cracks that are out of my ability range. I'm usually climbing a meandering crack or flake or stringing together a few crack systems into one pitch. I usually end up using mostly quickdraws with a few short slings and shoulder length slings mixed in here and there. 

First, it is unlikely that an unrated biner saves much, if any, weight compared to a full strength Nano or the like. Pot metal is often heavier than the aluminum used in climbing biners. Second, even if its lighter its probably also smaller and more difficult to clio and unclip. Even if you saved 10x5grams its certainly not worth 10x0.5 seconds of extra time trying to unclip gear especially if you're clipping at a crux. This is a definite case of false economy, even without accounting for the real, though maybe overstated, safety concerns brought up.