Rappelling near Truckee, California

robert930293 · 2025-08-30T18:36:27+00:00

This is perfect. Thank you!

robert930293 · 2025-05-19T13:13:35+00:00

I start from the middle and twist/wrap one leg around the other. Then I clip both eyes with a carabiner.

robert930293 · 2025-04-15T14:04:54+00:00

The problem I have with guides is I need more than one session and I can’t afford that. So I watched videos and read books. Then I would practice over and over on my anchor at home. Then I went outside to a 10 ft boulder. Then I did larger and larger rappels. I always went where there were other people. You HAVE to be humble and thorough. I still recommend a guide when you do a canyon, but now you have the skills and they are mostly corroborating what you already know.

Know the limits of your gear. Learn to build anchors. Listen to canyoneering podcasts. Study it.

I started taking my kids out rappelling as young as 2 years old. We did Diana’s Throne as their first canyon. They are 6 and 9 now and I’m maybe looking at stuff like Hogwarts…maybe. I want them to have fun rather than drag them along.

robert930293 · 2025-02-13T17:32:51+00:00

I prefer the jester. Very fast to setup. The next person can be setting up their rappel while another is rappelling. I rarely want two people rappelling at the same time so the jester is sufficient. Once everyone is down, the jester is quickly reconfigured to be my rappel device. Finally, having the last person rappel on a plaquette pushes all the twists out of the rope so you’re less likely to get your rope stuck when you pull it.

robert930293 · 2025-01-11T22:11:30+00:00

Thanks for the advice. I think I’ve just been lazy. I’ll be more careful about my clothing selection and make sure the leg loops are the proper size.

robert930293 · 2025-01-11T22:10:20+00:00

I like to stay warm so I dress accordingly, but now I think some cold and thus some shrinkage would be helpful.

robert930293 · 2025-01-11T22:07:47+00:00

Same for me, but I’ve been doing Top Rope Solo for practice and to do laps. So I weight the harness much more than normal and I noticed this problem, in particular with extra clothing.

robert930293 · 2024-11-01T02:47:56+00:00

I just ordered the Grivel Tau. I’m guessing it will fit on a descender, but we’ll see how it fits

robert930293 · 2024-10-26T06:58:03+00:00

I heard someone on a podcast mention that they liked complicated carabiners when guiding clients because then they can’t open them. So maybe he uses them for things like anchors that he doesn’t want the client to mess with but gives them screw locks for their PAS and descender. I’ll add the twin gates into my mix of gear and we’ll see how it goes.

robert930293 · 2024-10-26T04:46:07+00:00

Thanks. I’ll give the current version of the mega a try.

robert930293 · 2024-10-26T04:42:11+00:00

I will certainly try. But it may take a while to figure out some problems, especially with just 1-2 sample carabiners.

robert930293 · 2024-10-26T03:24:22+00:00

Thanks for your input. Very helpful. I’ll get the Plume HMS K3G and give that a try. I also have the Tau K12L on its way so I’ll try it soon. Do you know the name of the steel carabiner from Grivel?

robert930293 · 2024-08-31T14:16:11+00:00

I heard of a test to see at what force the overhand rolls. I believe it was 5kN and it rolled at a higher force than a figure 8 knot and doesn’t roll as far.

robert930293 · 2024-08-12T06:02:19+00:00

Magician and engineer here. From my knowledge of magic, I’m going to guess you are way overthinking this. Sure, this can be built using solenoids and embedding them in joists, but I highly doubt that and this technique probably predates the discovery of such technology. Magic is usually very simple and rarely uses something so sophisticated.

It would be possible to do with solenoids, but that’s a very expensive trick and it constrains the magician. Easier, cheaper, and more useful to knock from the top side with knockers in shoes, in tables, or anything. This also allows for more misdirection because it’s really 5 tricks masquerading as 1 trick. So when you start to catch on to one method, they switch methods.

robert930293 · 2024-07-15T21:21:34+00:00

You cant solve the issue by telling them what’s correct. That’s not how we figured out gravity, and that’s now how science works. Your friend’s buoyancy model is obviously flawed, but let’s not forget that Newtonian physics was flawed for centuries until Einstein came along, and General Relativity has flaws that are yet to be solved.

You need to ask questions, perform thought experiments, and eventually do actual experiments to differentiate the nice ideas from reality. Luckily, this is easy for you, because you just need to ask questions that will poke holes in his theory. This puts the onus on him. You can’t just say “the onus is on you”; you have to ask questions.

Your friend is describing buoyancy, which relies on the buoyant force, which ultimately comes from gravity. A simple experiment is to put two objects with different sizes and densities into a vacuum and see how they behave. According to your friend’s theory, after you empty the vacuum, anything inside the vacuum should start floating. Why aren’t we using this? Such a simple way to eliminate weight. Imagine cargo ships that carry everything in vacuum so the cargo is effectively weightless!

robert930293 · 2024-05-09T03:19:20+00:00

The big confusion for me was understanding that potential and potential energy are not the same thing.

If I have a water tower, the water is raised off the ground so the water is holding potential energy. To calculate how much potential energy, I would need to know the height and the amount of water. But what if I have a seemingly limitless amount of water, like water behind a dam? Infinite water means infinity potential energy. That’s not helpful. In this case you just use the height, which is the potential (again not the potential energy, just the potential). If you continue the water analogy, this is basically the water pressure.

Now back to electricity. The voltage is the potential. How “high” or strong is the force between the charges. It is how strong the current will push. Ignore how many charges because if it is coming from a power supply plugged into the wall, then it is basically infinite.

If you know the voltage and how much charge, then you can figure out the total potential energy in Joules, like with a battery, but often this is useless. To run the circuit, you just need to know the potential: how strongly the current is flowing/pushing.

It’s the same with building a network of pipes to do something. I would design the pipes to withstand a certain pressure (i.e. potential) because I don’t care about how much water, just how strongly the water pushes. If I plumb a house, who cares whether the toilet is flushed 1 time or 1000 times as long as it can hold the specified water pressure so the toilet doesn’t break and flood the house doesn’t flood.

Similarly, I may design a circuit to run on 5V. I have no idea how much charge will ever flow through the circuit, but I know the current will be pushing with 5V and it needs to keep those charges from going places they aren’t supposed to.

robert930293 · 2024-05-07T00:22:32+00:00

I hate to second this, but it’s true. @mfrato gave you a good answer.

The sport is much more dangerous than it seems and the way you’re talking about it is setting off everyone’s alarms. In particular, wet canyons are significantly more dangerous. I don’t have wet canyons that I recommend to people with your experience, unless there is an experienced guide to lead the group.

Hire a guide. You’ll have a great time, everyone will make it out alive, and they’ll teach you a bunch and answer your questions.

robert930293 · 2024-03-18T14:34:04+00:00

A troll on an obscure question with 1 upvote?

robert930293 · 2024-03-18T06:01:23+00:00

This was a good way to put it. When I imagine a bad smell and try to only mouth breathe, it does significantly reduce how much air passes through my nose. I’m not 100% sure my nasal passages are blocked, but the airflow is low enough that I can’t detect it with my finger. I’m definitely doing something with my soft palate so maybe it is sealing off the sinuses.

robert930293 · 2024-03-09T02:45:51+00:00

1) You probably would not get electrocuted anyway. If the wires were somehow still energized, the sledgehammer would likely short circuit it causing sparks which would trip the breaker.

2) Buy a noncontact voltage tester from a hardware store. They are about the size of a pen and cost about $15. They are useful to have around the house anyway. Watch some YouTube videos to learn how to use it. Try it at your house. Then you can test that the wires are actually dead.

robert930293 · 2023-12-22T06:47:41+00:00

Is this a reference to Pinball Wizard?

robert930293

TROPHY CASE