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Gear free srt?

slonstdy

Well-Known Member
SH Member
Joined
Oct 10, 2018
Messages
1,377
For my hunts I've been one stick climbing up and rappelling down and it dawned on me what if I had to get down from the tree for a few moments in the middle of the hunt for some reason, maybe I dropped my phone or my gear grapple couldn't retrieve an item , or maybe to answer the call of nature. What would I do? In years past the answer was simple, unhook my harness and climb down my tree bolts or sticks and climb back up when I was ready but now I would have to rappel down and one stick climb again and that would require bringing my tether and climbing stick down with me. Seems like there are a few important details to remember to make sure the evolution runs smoothely and I don't strand my gear in the tree with no immediate way to get back up.

It dawned on me to srt up the rope but that would require specialized gear which is more weight to carry, an increase in noise liability and also expensive to buy for the off chance I would need to use that stuff. How else can I get up the rope without penalties of any sort? Then it hit me . . . FRICTION HITCHES!!

Rummaged thru my stash of ropes and accessory cords and out to the tree I went. I set my rope 20' in the tree and attached a prussik loop to the rope and connected it to my bridge with a biner. I set a distel hitch lower on the rope and used a biner to connect a foot loop made from accessory cord and placed my foot in it. I raised the distel up the rope to a comfortable height for me to step and then I stood on the foot loop and raised the prussik to put tension on my bridge and then sat in my saddle. I was airborne! I continued this distel up, stand, prussik up and sit routine advancing the hitches each time until I got on my platform. Quick and easy, just the way I like it. I went down the rope the same way moving the distel first and placing my weight on it then reaching up and sliding the bridge prussik down and sitting to unload the distel then repeated distel, stand, prussik, sit . . .

I found the prussik to bind too well and require noticeably more effort to release on the way down whereas the distel was a pleasure to use. I will experiment with the schwabisch and klemheist hitches to see if one of those works out better but as of now I would use two distels and forget about the prussik. The only "extra" gear required for this is two distel hitch cords and a foot loop of some sort, all of which can be stuffed in a pants pocket.

Does anyone use this friction hitch method to srt because I've never seen it mentioned before? It seems to have all our saddlehunter requirements - light weight, silence, minimalistic, ease of use and cost effectiveness.
What do you guys think? Am I overlooking anything?
 
Honestly the biggest bulk is more in the extra rope in most cases. If you have the rope to rappel there's minimal extra. If hitches work well - great. If you prefer ascender(could use e.g ropemen if you use them...), grigri/safeguard, etc. they're minimal extra to carry (but a few bucks).
 
I always come back to this video to keep the SRT simple and cheap. I've SRT'd this way and like it because of its minimalistic style. It's easy and simple to understand IMO.

I used bluewater climbing webbing from rei as a sling and a self made prussic.

 
I've thought about doing this, but haven't had the time or mental space to think it through and try it. Maybe next year.

There is a lot about it I find appealing, but want to work out some stuff in terms of materials, bridge length, etc.

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk
 
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