Shunt Ascender popular

While climbing in Kootenai Canyon south of Missoula years ago, i had to rap down under a roof to retrieve some gear. I had to let go of my brake hand and fiddle with some gear. My full weight on the rope welded my prussic cord to the rope and there I was under a roof project, where i was stranded for the better part of 2 hours, in the drizzle and twillight....This was before I started carrying a sharp knife, before Vertical Limit, before I always carried runners, t-blocks and smoke flares. Anyway, I wanted to get as far away from prussics as possible when i bought a Petzl Shunt-a mechanical prussic. The thing is relatively heavy. You need a little extra gear to use it. But on full length rappels I like it over an auto-block, which is slow and if it isn't slow , I am always worried of sawing through the auto-block with rope friction- which is a matter of preference. I use it on bigger climbs when I want a little extra margin....the heck with my lightweight, purist 5 peice gear rack climbing collegues who hate to see anyone with more than 6 pieces on their rack or extra gear.....screw them...... Try this thing, it has a good use when ya need it for that. BAMMMM!

This tool is mainly useful for rapdrilling routes. It is probably not worth the weight to use for multipitch and trad climbing. After all, how much junk can you bring along when trad climbing?

I had the shunt given to me by a close friend and for cleaning routes and route development i think its awsome. . Its ability to be used as and auto locking repel device and when backed up with a convensional atc to be used as a partial ascender makes it perfect for the task.

No better device for rapping with a load or when you are stopping on a rap to do work like replacing anchors. This is one of the least understood and under appreciated pieces of gear on the market today. The way to use it is to extend your rap device off your harness and attach the shunt to your belay loop with a locker. Then rap normally, but with your upper hand on the Shunt rather than on the rope and just ignore the rap device.

I have used this device more than a few times and found its weight to usefullness not good, its overly complex for a rappel backup (use a spider rap and you avoid alot of issues, instead)

For trad not at all recommended, and for anything else not recommend.

I keep it as a reminder of what not to buy.

Why waste weight, lets look at this in a serious light.

All you need to rappel is : ATC or reverso (some sort of device thats light eh), cord for prusik, medium length sling.

These are all things found on a rack.

Spider belay (look it up)

A shunt is 190g, 3 cliff bars (68 each) 204g... Bring an item you can already builld from your rack and go a bit hungry ....

Lets not mention its 54 dollars for a device... I should mention that on page 135 of petzl own adverts they use a prusik and not a shunt, I could not find a tech diagram in there book... :)