Bachar Ladder Help

I'm looking for ideas on how to make a Bachar ladder. I'm aiming to make it about 20 feet long, and I have a general idea of what I'm going to do. However, I'm new to this, have never climbed a rock save for scrambling up some here and there on a whim, so I'm not familiar with gear, and I'm concerned about the top connection for the ladder. I looked up carabiners on the REI website, and I'm just curious if I should trust my weight to such a small piece of aluminum. I suppose I'm being silly, considering climbers trust their lives to these things regularly. More than that, my first mountain bike frame is aluminum, and I put that thing through some rough terrain, so I shouldn't be so wary, right?

As long as it’s not a keychain carabiner you’ll be fine. Just grab a simple locking carabiner so you don’t have to worry about it popping open.

Nolan is right, I don’t know why I didn’t think of just suggesting some quick links for chains. It’d be cheaper and plenty strong for something like that. I’d have a blast watching someone try to break a sling with their bare hands. You couldn’t break 1/4” rope with your bare hands haha

John Flynn wrote: I'm looking for ideas on how to make a Bachar ladder. I'm aiming to make it about 20 feet long, and I have a general idea of what I'm going to do. However, I'm new to this, have never climbed a rock save for scrambling up some here and there on a whim, so I'm not familiar with gear, and I'm concerned about the top connection for the ladder. I looked up carabiners on the REI website, and I'm just curious if I should trust my weight to such a small piece of aluminum. I suppose I'm being silly, considering climbers trust their lives to these things regularly. More than that, my first mountain bike frame is aluminum, and I put that thing through some rough terrain, so I shouldn't be so wary, right?

The Bacharach ladder is renown for blowing out shoulders

djh860 wrote:

The Bacharach ladder is renown for blowing out shoulders

And elbows.

djh860 wrote:

The Bacharach ladder is renown for blowing out shoulders

That sucks... any reason as to why and what I should avoid doing? Aside from the ladder itself, that is?

John Flynn wrote:

That sucks... any reason as to why and what I should avoid doing? Aside from the ladder itself, that is?

It's the ladder itself.

John Flynn wrote: I'm looking for ideas on how to make a Bachar ladder. 

However, I'm new to this, have never climbed a rock

Doesn’t seem weird, ninja warrior is all the craze now it’s hit Netflix!!!! 

What about it is odd?

If you have never climbed, but are training for climbing. Maybe you are training for someonthing else, as someone suggested. 

If anyone wants to buy a GENUINE Chouinard Bachar Ladder, PM me.

My take on the injury deal is that the BL was just the first really stressful training device/routine to promote folks to get hurt on. As such, it blazed the way for fingerboards and campus board that followed. None should be used by folks just starting out.

So the thing is I have a very fitness-focused line of work, but my current position demands so much of my time that it's not really conducive to staying in shape besides all the lower body conditioning that's done. That said, I recently got interested in climbing, and I just want to be actually ready or in shape enough to get into it without having to worry about my fitness level. Using this app I found that there's not a lot of climbing near me, and I only found one gym nearby with a climbing wall, though it's not actually a climbing gym, so if I end up making a few hours' drive each way I'd like to know that I'll actually be able to hang. I'm not sure why this sounds odd to anybody, but there it is.

So for John’s case, isn’t a Bachar Ladder as poor an option as a hangboard?  I’m finally pushing into 5.11 territory after years of climbing myself, and have just started to hangboard in the last year - I can tell that I would have quickly injured myself if I’d started earlier in my climbing career.  The ladder seems like a recipe for similar disaster for someone just getting into climbing - wouldn’t a regime of pull-ups on jugs (say on, ahem, a hangboard) be a better option?

Ps, the best training for climbing is climbing.  If you can’t get outside, build a woody :))

The Bachar Ladder is an archaic and outdated torture device known for giving you unrivaled lock-off power as well as a raging case of elbow tendonitis.  Have fun with it.

Thank you for the input, both in favor of and opposed to the ladder. I think I wanted to make it for two reasons. I wanted a fairly inexpensive training tool, and I felt like if I made it myself then it'd be a motivator to actually use it. I might work on other stuff over time, too, like a small climbing wall if I can find a spot for it, and I've considered trying to make a hangboard, too, if I can figure it out. 

Pretty simple setup at a friends. The rope is just looped around the branch at the top and then draped back down and fixed around the base.