Heavy Load or Icy- or Thin-Line Rappels Need This Friction Hack

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If you’ve been following the channel (or the blog) for a while, you know that my boys are small because, well, they are young boys, and that I’m small by general adult sizes ;) That means that one of the things we generally haven’t had to worry about is rappel friction. A standard rappel setup will almost always create enough friction for us to feel in control and safe. If anything, on low-angle slab climbs we sometimes have to invert our devices so that the brake strand is not going over the friction-adding teeth in our plaquette devices, thus reducing friction.

But there are always exceptions.

I’ve had three different circumstances where I’ve wanted to add friction to my rappel: 1) iced-over ropes; 2) really skinny ropes combined with a single-strand rappel; 3) rappelling with extra weight like when practicing rescue procedures so having two bodies on one device in a tandem setup.

So, even though we are very rarely wanting to add friction to a rappel, even we have needed it from time to time. So, when adding that friction, I like to have a small quiver of methods to choose from. Different ropes, different carabiners, different rappel devices (I typically use the DMM Pivot, by the way), different angles of terrain… they all can change the amount of friction any one setup might produce. So, I might need to tailor a setup to produce more or less friction because I might have a rope or whatever that is, itself causing more or less friction.

Thus, three options for adding friction to a rappel. Take a look!