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lambone
Jul 1, 2005, 12:51 AM
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Hey Guys/Girls,
I have the opportunity to put a slackline in the new climbing gym I am building, and the cool part is that I could rig it 15ft off the deck.
I am not much a slackliner myself, but know it's the cool thing to be doing these days. TThat is why I am here for input.
Any advice on important things I should think about?
Of course the slackliner would need to be belayed from some sort of rig from above, either clipped into a safety line with a daisy, or some sort of trolly TR system.
You can see our gym layout here:
http://www.roguerockgym.com/
The line would come off the high side of the top-out boulder to the adjacent lead/tr wall.
The framing is being welded up now, and the anchors would be placed soon, so any input is appreciated.
Cheers,
Matt
Rogue Rock Gym
Medford, Oregon
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slacklinejoe
Jul 1, 2005, 2:15 AM
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15 foot is too low to rely on leashed falls (or at least in my opinion). You'll most likely have to go with an overhead line (trolly TR belay as you mentioned). The slackline sags under body weight, and then a fall would put them too low and they'd splat.
Overhead line is safer anyway for a gym atmosphere, I can only image taking a leashed fall and swinging hard into a little kid running around underneight the line.
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lvclimbingbum
Jul 1, 2005, 9:35 PM
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We've had a highline set up in our gym before. About 20 feet off the ground. Ya, for a gym, a trolley toprope would work best.
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accorddude
Jul 29, 2005, 3:46 AM
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Sounds like a cool idea but I really only had fun on a slackline the first time I did it. I learned when I started working at the gym but at least i dident get many kicks out of it. By the way that is an awesome looking gym setup. That boulder looks sweet.
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lambone
Oct 3, 2006, 9:48 PM
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Hi Folks, just wanted to update this.
we rigged the Highline in the gym and lots of people have been having a great time on it.
of cours at only 20ft up it would be too dangerous to tether straight to the line. So we rigged saftey ropes above the line that you daisy chain into.
No problems so far and it seems pretty bomber. We use two ropes, two daisies, two full strength pullyes that trolley along the lines, and backed up anchors off steel.
You have a bit of interference from the daisies which sometimes get in your face. You can also slighlty feel them trailing behind you.
We pad the edge of the boulder that you step off. This is my biggest fear, falling right at that point and knocking your head on the boulder. There have also been some funky upsideown falls that had me nervous. Otherwise I am confident in the set up and I have taken many whips on it myself.
It is nice to walk a highline totaly calm because you know it is a nice safe soft catch if you blow it.
I'll try to get a pic posted.
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deadhorse
Oct 3, 2006, 11:08 PM
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How long is the line? I think if I had a gym at my disposal (or an ideal positioning of trees) I might try to go a little crazy with the slackline stuff. Crossing lines or somethig, that would force a transfer, or big incline/decline. But it sounds really cool what you've got. As I understand the setup you could potentially boulder a problem, rig in, walk the line, rig, the TR/Lead without a break. Could be a fun circuit!
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slackinjacklyn
Oct 3, 2006, 11:53 PM
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I always thought climbing gyms would be great places for midlines, every gym should have one!! I have one in my back yard, 8 feet below my 22ft high highline (which has been walked by others, but not by me yet (hopefully real soon). (52' long btw). I found that the 2 key things to make a midline great fun is a tie in to the back of your harness, and a SMOOTH running tandem pulley trailing behind you overhead. I guess if your overhead line is a rope(s) or a cable then a good store bought tandem pulley would do. Because my overhead line is a (tripled) 1 inch highline, I had to make my own tandem pulley. I used skateboard wheels and it works great. I later heard that (scott balcom?) made a similar skateboard wheel pulley long before I did?
-Terry
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lambone
Oct 4, 2006, 7:23 PM
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the line is about 40 ft.
We tried a fat static saftey line overhead at first but it made for a pretty jarring fall, so we switched to two dynamic lines. We use a Mammut Supersafe. The lines stretch out alot after several falls and need to be re-tightened so we use a clove hitch backed up by an 8 on a bite to make adjustments.
We use a Petzl Tandem Pully (often used for zip-lines), and a Regular pully rigged on top of the tandem.
Worst injury so far was a rope burn, as I predicted in my first post. Of course I am the one who got the worst rope burn! ha!
Kids love it! They can use the daisy chain for balance, so they can "pretend" to slackline. I think it still helps their balancing skills a lot.
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