I think I've tried all of these, they are very difficult, they can be done, I just wasn't willing to put in the practice to make them work. The 2 rope palm tree climbers have very stiff rope, I thought my stiff rope might work....wrong, it needs to be very stiff. Not really sure what to tell ya. The aider with a tether seemed to work pretty well, I made the Sam Potter stick and tried it and quickly gave up... Good luck, nothing costs much so give it all a try and report back, it's possible I've missed something!