Higher than fall factor 2 possible???

So I was just doing some regular old gear research and I can across a thought inspired by a lead climbing auto belay....

https://rockandice.com/videos/climbing/auroco-epic-portable-auto-belay-for-lead-climbing/?cn-reloaded=1

BTW this is going to be an armchair philosopher type discussion... Not very realistic but just for the fun of it...

And so let's say your using this thing on some sort of industrial access or the figure out how to make it small enough to lead solo real life walls with it... And you say have 20 feet from the device and your first protection... Unrealistic but humor me... And you fall...

If it worked just like a real belayer who had an iron grip and just lets you fall... 20 ft to the device and then 20ft to the end of the rope... 40ft fall on 20ft of rope... Obviously factor 2...

BUT if it could reel in rope as your falling you could potentially fall... 20ft to the device... It reels in 15ft... Then 5ft to the end of the rope left... 25ft on to 5ft of rope... Fall factor of 5...

Or you climb 10ft and it reels in 9ft... 10ft plus the 1ft of rope left out... Factor of 11...esentially only limited by how much rope it can reel in theoretically... 

Does this seem possible?

Anyone have any thoughts on this and info on converting distance fallen into forces?

Excited to discuss... 

Well, the important thing is how does fall factor relate to the ultimate forces involved.  Fall factor is an approximation of the forces that will impact your body and gear.  But, many factors will affect the actual forces experienced by all involved, including, but not limited to Fall Factor.

A heavier climber, heavier belayer, less elastic rope, static belay device, anchored belayer, etc, as well as Fall Factor will affect the forces to all people and gear involved.  Yet, in the scenario you propose, a shorter distance of free fall will have less kinetic energy to be dissipated by the rope, belayer, climber and other components of the system.

So, in your hypothetical, when the fall factor could be much higher, the total energy that must be dissipated would be much less.  

Your scenario does apply to simul climbing though.  Potentially very high fall factors and impact forces if the follower falls and pulls the leader off.  Not good.

What is your question?

So then how do we put numbers to these forces?

I like the energy comment because yes kinetic energy would be lower in the 10ft above the device than 100ft.... Is there a good way to find an equation for forces without thinking about fall factor?

Based on fall factor it could be much higher than forces usually seen correct?

Andrew Lamb wrote:

Based on fall factor it could be much higher than forces usually seen correct?

No.  Re read my post.

via ferrata

This final situation is unusual but sees the lanyard clipped to a vertical cable.  Now the operator can fall 3m on their 1m lanyard which gives FF3.  This would be a very dangerous fall.

This not as hypothetical as you might think. If you fall in a normal situation but the falling rope gets trapped behind a flake or in a crack you could have a ff greater than 2.

Higher-than-2 fall factors are possible on a via ferrata system, where you are clipping to a long cable which is intermittently attached to the rock.  if you imagine you're 20 feet above the last cable anchoring point and fall,  you would take a 20 foot fall onto your lanyard.  This is why via ferrata lanyard systems typically include some sort of screamer or other energy absorbing device.

Climber is free soloing 200 ft off the ground, climber falls.  There is no rope in the system: fall factor infinity!