help with the Ekka pulley advance

sawsong

hi guys. all my new gear appeared today so after a couple of weeks getting used to the blakes, i thought i would try as per Ekka's video, advancing it with a micropulley. couple of gratuitous photos to follow.

problem is, im not sure if ive got anything wrong on it, but it seems mightily hard to advance the knot with the pulley compared to the amount of force on it to do it with my left hand if that makes any sense. perhaps now im pulling with both hands, im being more lazy with my bodythrust. is this common?

heres a couple pics for you to see if ive got it set right

cheers

jim

Eric Frei

Buddy, you got that Blakes tied WRONG!

It's in SUISLIDE mode.

The tail of the blakes has to come out the other side of the climbing line, the LH side and out the back if you know what I mean.

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Eric Frei

Also try with the pulley flipping around 180 degrees.... so the biner attaching it etc is at the back of the bridge on the Blakes.

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sawsong

ah thanks a million dude. ive been looking at it and wondering what wasnt right about it. it would seemingly grab fine but it never seemed to dress quite right.

having the photo in front of me now and the tc companion by my laptop here, i can see exactly what i keep doing wrong. as i tie it, im bringing the downward loop of the blakes in front of the working end of the bridge instead of behind it.

yeah i had the pulley behind the bridge to start with, and thinking that was the problem, i brought it to the front. I shall remedy it and report back.

I guess this is why we start low and slow. I feel like a right dummy

btw im finding this kolibri saddle very comfortable indeed. i find the very fixed side Ds make the saddle pull in a lot more when stropping a narrow trunk but no uncomfortably so due to the size of the back strap

newguy18

I use a screw link for self advancing knots and used a combo of blakes/tautline yesterday and both worked great.Ekka [as usual]hit the nail on the head.its funny how i still find myself using tautline even though i know of several knots i have used that are 10 times better.I use tautline on all my td's.Just old habits i guess.

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old schooler

sawsong

right, i believe i've now done it by the book. if ive got this right, great, cos ive just tied it and retied it a dosen times. first 3 with the book, following 9 without

Eric Frei

Yeah, that looks right.

You'll have to run up that rope and down get some polish off it and that blakes worn in a bit. I rarely untie them, just leave it on the climbing line but do check them now and then then ditch them.

The VT / hitch climber guys will be straight onto you any minute.

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sawsong

sounds like a good excuse for putting in some more climbing time! not that i need one particularly.

now that DOES sound dangerous. the number of things ive heard about VTs, apart from the fact theyre french makes me wonder if the supposed 'ease' of using them is kinda too unbalanced by their lets say 'quirky' nature. certainly not something i'll try for a few months probably

newguy18

vt is a great hitch but definatly not for beginers stick with the blakes and get the hang of it for awhile.Better to use something fool proof that something as fussy as a vt that can hurt you if misused.

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old schooler

sawsong

right. here come my findings.

im sorry to say that my pulley still isnt advancing my blakes sufficiently easily. in fact the rope is very hard to pull through even with both hands. if i switch back to doing it manually it's far easier. i can only think either the pulley is the wrong shape to advance it, or more likely im not bodythrusting in the same way as i do when using my left hand to advance the knot.

any thoughts?

thanks

newguy18

Try running the prusik directly through the pulley[i.e get rid of the snap,biner,screw link.]

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old schooler

sawsong

yeah i'll try that tomorrow. thought about setting it up that way in the first place but it makes it less easy to assemble cos i'll have to put the biner into the prusik loop. no biggy. was just a keychain biner, which is cool with it not being safety related i guess?

Eric Frei

In our video Brother Colin did have a different pulley but it slid pretty easily.

Try with switching out the Blakes for a Klemheist. You'll need a loop for the klemheist.

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dannyboysfc

Not to sound negative, but you may end up just stopping trying to make this work, I did. I got it to work OK, but for ascending DdRT I can go much faster with the blakes tied at arms length and just body thrusting. Now for moving around the tree I like the blakes tied close as possible with a micro pulley just below for taking up the slack one handed.

quercus

Like Ekka said... The VT crew is here....


aaaaaaaah young wallaby's gear came through ay....

Nice gear mate. Nice setup too. Bit bulky for now but hey, you are doin' it safe. The reason why this could be difficult to advance is because the sheaves of that pullet touch each other when in closed position. You need to check if the climbing line doesn't touch the sheaves when it's advancing. If it does, that could cause some additional friction.Best pulley for a self advancing knot is the petzl fixe.It has fixed sheaves but the are some 1.5 cm's apart at the tie-in point so they don't touch the rope when advancing.

I hope this helps out....

quercus

Everything in a primary life support system is safety related. The way I see it, you shouldn't incorporate anything in your primary or secondary life support wich is not certified for actual climbing use. I'm a bit allergic to that.

sawsong

thanks mate, i'll check the clearances on the pulley

no problem, i'll try it with a triple lock or just with the cord straight through the pulley sheaves

Bermy

Are you using a friction saver up at your TIP?
If your rope is going over a natural crotch, there may be quite a bit of friction to overcome...I find the self tending setup only works really well when using a friction saver, otherwise the rope just sticks on the bark and is hard to advance.

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Col2y

Why use a half inch rope for your pressek i use a shoe lace, it doesnt have to be that strong and its alot less cumbersome

newguy18

So the saftey police don't get him.

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old schooler

Eric Frei

Yeah, we had a cambium saver set up.

When you are body thrusting you really are only trying to pull up half your body weight, depending how good the hip thrust is you might also only be pulling the slack rope in!

But if you are using this set up try to just scull drag your azz up the tree then you're gonna be pulling a lot of weight, all your weight plus the friction up top. You still have to make like you're body thrusting or walking up etc.

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newguy18

could be worse,could be footlocking.

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Col2y

ill try and post some pics of my set up tomoro its pretty slick

sawsong

forgot about this for a little while

1: yeah im running a cambium saver

2: yeah i might have got a bit lazy with my bodythrusting but now ive got my saddle adjusted i can trunk walk a lot more comfortably

3: the prusik isnt actually half inch. it's some roughly 9mm stuff i had thrown in on my order just as prusik cord incredibly flexible stuff whatever it is

4: i think the pulley might be the culprit. i was doing some deadwooding yesterday and as i ascended, my blakes got alongside a limb and advanced itself in the manner that it should do on the pulley. gonna order myself a petzl fixe. cant hurt to try it.



might start trying some other hitches too. possibly distel, see how i get on with it. the blakes when i had it tied wrongly was very progressive. now ive got it tied correctly it feels very off or on, i have very little to no speed control.

Jeff Darby

A knot is either tied correctly or it's not a knot at all!

If you tie the knot double check it..Set and dress it.

If someone else ties it check it like your life depends on it!

Good luck

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sawsong

it was certainly a knot, it just wasnt a properly set blakes. one of the tucks was on the wrong side of the tail end of the climbing line so it was still holding the rope but it wasnt sitting right.

but regardless. i get it right now but i dont like how the knot performs all the time. it might just need getting used to but there might be a better knot out there for me!

quercus

Jay is right about this, mate.... There are only two ways to tie a knot. Exactly right and hopelessly wrong. You should practice some more with a fool-proof knot. It will be the method you can always fall back too when things get hazy or unclear. Everything gets easier after that when you try different knots like VT and such.I teach occasionally, and no-one gets to lift their asses 1 foot off the ground without being able to tie a double fisherman's knot, prussik and bow-line behind their backs.
When it comes down to it, there are only two things whom are actually necessary to climb a tree and that's a harness and a climbing line. Explore that method in case you lose some equipment when you're up there...

sawsong

fair enough, perhaps i shouldnt have tried to make any excuses for getting it wrong in the first place, but anyway, ive been climbing on the correct blakes now multiple times daily ever since then and not only can i tie that with my eyes shut but i can do the three you mention too, prusik's double fishermans (can tie up a prusik loop eyes shut too) and bowlines.

anyway for anyone interested, ive been making some headway, i ditched the pulley for now and put it on my hip to keep the tail tidy, learnt to footlock, and booked onto my tree climbing and aerial rescue course... (if dad's done it yet. think he was doing it through the farm business)

Eric Frei

Good to hear, fast footlockers will beat most people up a tree, Iknow comps show fast pole climbers will do an 80' pole in about the same time as a footlocker does a 40' one but in the real tree the spur climbing guy has branches to navigate ....

... but in saying that the footlocker has to set a line.

Oh, and there's pruning where all have to set a line, no spurs, unless of course you take on this approach to tree work.

The Real Tree Facts by Harold McPeak| USA Visionary Arborist NOT!

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sawsong

haha that's a good read

I dont actually own any spurs yet. why would I? that would only tempt me to do take downs that I am not trained/qualified/good enough to do yet. so it's all spikeless access for me for a while yet. And i wouldnt have it any other way