Spiderjack and thinner rope.

[Ricky26wales]

Hi people and sorry as I know spiderjack has been done to death. I'm a fairly new climber (6 months+) and recently got my spiderjack which I'm loving. Problem is i have a 13mm xtc rope. Obviously things aqrn't running as smooth as I'd like so was thinking of moving to poison ivy or something similar. I've mentioned to some lads at work that I want to get a thinner rope and they think that smaller rope will ruin my hands as it's alot harder to grip etc. Has anyone moved to smaller rope and not liked it. I want to get the most out my spiderjack and poison ivy sounds like a nice rope even if it is thinner.

 

Also I read a post quite a while back about dismantling with spiderjack, like it should never be used to choke around the stem as a back up while chogging down. What do you spiderjack users do once you've stripped a tree and it's time to chog down. Back to friction cord? Figure of 8? I'm after something thats safe and practical without too much messing about. And don't know if it's due to the thickness of my rope but once my SJ is fullyloaded with my weight I sometimes find it hard for it to release straight away when I want it to. Seems to jam a bit unless I pull on the rope abit to get a bit of weight off the SJ but then it releases fine and runs as it should. Sorry if that sounds confusing.

 

Any pointers would be appreciated. And that velcro that came with SJ lasted about 20 minutes until it had pulled itself off the SJ. Didn't see how just noticed once I was out the tree. Cheers

[MattyF]

13 mm rope should be quite heavy there for self tend better... Out of all the ropes I've tried the edelrid experience seems to work best..it's about a 12 mm quite stiff like tachyon and a nice weight that it still self tends well. Imori to soft but a nice diameter, tachyon seems ok but not heavy enough to self tend untill a fair height and thinner.

The Velcro seems to be useless, I found attaching a new bit then using a small tape sling to wrap the Velcro around and clip your working rope eye on too made the stickiness of the velcro last longer especially in wet dirty conditions.

[Old Mill Tree Care]

I don't have an SJ, I've been on a Lockjack with 13mm XTC which isn't good and feels like 20mm when it's wet.

I've been following every SJ and LJ thread this year and I'll be changing to Poison Ivy next.

[Scottish]

Rope wise it seems a bit of a personnal thing, I found xp was a reet nightmare, too big and too hard, it was always slipping and I couldn't get a smooth descent on it. It seems to bite better on the softer ropes. Tachyon is my favourite so far, though will probably give it a whirl on poison ivy next week. Thinner ropes are nastier on the hands but you get used to it, gloves help too.

As for chogging down SJ is ace, holds you right into the stem where a hitch climber or that would leave you some slack.

As for the velcro, I got a sling in there, cut the ring finger off an old climbing glove, made a tiny hole in it for the screw then squeezed the sling through it. Perfect.

[Paul Smith]

The Spiderjack is excellent with Tachyon, I find poison ivy bouncy.

[Joe Loggs]

The Spiderjack is excellent with Tachyon, I find poison ivy bouncy.

 

see I tried tachyon but found that tougher on the hands I prefer pi much softer.

[atree]

Yeah Tacyhon for me to Thinking of getting some velocity tho

[Joe Loggs]

Abit off subject but has anyone adjusted the wood stop so it's less of a push upwards to grip the rope? I done this and found I had more control over decent.

[scottythepinetree]

I don't think 12mm rope is that big a leap grip-wise. A work mate who was having trouble with 11mm ropes recently bought a poison-ivy rope and reckons its sorted the problem.

 

I'm currently running New England Fly 11mm on the SJ and find it tends really well. Needs a bit of length below it though, but that's only a problem for the first 10' of the tree.

[Scottish]

Yeah Tacyhon for me to Thinking of getting some velocity tho

 

I didn't have fun with Velocity, was too thin and too hard i thought. Wouldn't hold properly, and went through the SJ like sh*t off a shovel. Maybe just takes getting used to, but after an hour or so of not enjoying it I went back to my Tachyon.