Use The Rope To Tie Into Anchors

Testing the strength of falling directly onto slings, is a good reminder that your PAS/daisy chain is great if you're going to keep it tight at all times. Attaching your rope to a Master Point made with slings, is a good way to absorb falling forces. It also appears that clove hitches and overhand knots absorb the forces too. And nylon absorbs forces more than Dyneema. (Watch the video at the link for a detailed explanation.)

"Carrying out a final test replacing the slings with 8.2 mm rope for a worst-case scenario with a fall-factor two clearly showed – as expected – that utilising the shock absorbing properties of your rope dramatically lessens the impact forces on the anchors and is the best option. This could be by either clipping the anchors directly with the rope or into a central point in the system. For a full explanation and examination of the results watch the video...The results show how very high forces can easily be generated using slings to attach to anchor points if there is slack in the system. Clearly, it’s important to be aware of this if for example, you are moving around at a stance while clipped into an anchor using a sling or rigging a multi-pitch abseil. For perspective, most leader falls are between 4 – 7 kNs. Forces above 10kN may cause internal injuries – 10kN equates to 1 metric tonne."

Sling Set-up	Material	FF1 (Force kN)	FF2 (Force kN)
Overhand Knots	Nylon	8.8	11.1
	Dyneema	11 sling broke	10.4 sling broke
Clove Hitches	Nylon	9	13.1 sling cut a bit
	Dyneema	10.2 a bit of melting	10.8 slippage of hitches
‘Self-Equalising’ (Sliding X)	Nylon	11.5	19.7
	Dyneema	16.1	27
Equalised with Overhand Knot	Nylon	10.8	15.5
	Dyneema	12.5	21.7 sling broke
Clove Hitches + Anchor Point Fail	Nylon	5.5	-
	Dyneema	5.5	-
‘Self-Equalising’ (Sliding X) + Anchor Point Fail	Nylon	10.2	-
	Dyneema	14.9	-
Equalised with Overhand Knot + Anchor Point Fail	Nylon	7.1	-
	Dyneema	4.9	-
Dynamic Rope (Pair of 8.5mm tied off with clove hitches)	Dynamic Rope	-	7.6