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Question about Quick-draws

Original Post
Dominic Mase · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Aug 2018 · Points: 0

I recently bought ten Trango phase quick-draws for sport climbing. I did not realize when purchasing that these were ultralight draws with super thin dog-bones. I intend to project with these draws but I I do not want to repeatedly whip on a thin strand of dynma. I found some thicker Eldrid dog-bones online for decently cheap, basically I was wondering if its safe to mix and match dog bones and carabiners from different companies. Any Ideas?      

Noah R · · Burlington, VT · Joined Nov 2018 · Points: 0

Totally safe as long as all of the components are in good shape, which it seems they would be.

Andrew Rice · · Los Angeles, CA · Joined Jan 2016 · Points: 11

Yes, it's safe. To be honest, though, a "thin strand of dyneema" like the bone in the Phase is plenty strong to whip on all day long. I replaced all my thin sport bones with thicker ones because I liked the handling of the stiffer, thick draws better in sport situations. But don't kid yourself that the Phase bone is weak. 

Patrick Deliman · · Bear valley CA · Joined May 2015 · Points: 150

use them, I doubt you’ll be taking 22 kn falls 

Josh · · Golden, CO · Joined Jan 2006 · Points: 1,315

Yes, it is quite safe to mix and match the components of a quickdraw from different manufacturers.  My own sport draws are a "Frankenstein" home job consisting of biners from two different companies and dogbones from a third.  More to the point, and like Senor Arroz said, those ultrathin dyneema dogbones on the Trango Phase draws you got are plenty strong enough for any projecting you are going to do.  The only real differences with getting thicker dogbones might be durability and feel/handling.  Strand for strand, dyneema is stronger and lighter than nylon, though it has less elasticity.  So dyneema dogbones can be made thinner and still exceed the strength limits you'll need for nearly all sport climbing fall situations.  Since it has almost zero stretch, whereas nylon has at least a little, there are very specific situations where nylon dogbones will be more resistant to abrasion or getting cut against a sharp edge, but most of the time the difference will only come down to price and weight and personal preference.

One caveat if you do swap your dogbones for a different brand.  Make sure you set them up correctly.  There have been incidents of climbers accidentally rigging their quickdraws with biners only clipped through the rubber keeper loops and not through the sling material at all.  If you are less experienced and have any doubts, have some other (more trained/experienced) folks check out your draws after you've modified them.  Also, occasionally the rubber keeper rings/loops on one set of dogbones won't match the width or curvature of a particular biner very well, making the biner sit at a funny angle to the rest of the draw.  For this reason, you may end up having to buy dogbones that more closely match the width of the ones you're replacing, at least at their ends.  Most of the time, you'll be fine, though.

Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

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