Adventures with swamis?

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mooser

Trad climber

seattle

Topic Author's Original Post - Jul 14, 2006 - 10:45am PT

It's been great reading the postings from the first half of this year on the Stonemasters, and what occurs to me is how incredibly far the "technology" of climbing has come over the last 30 years--but in particular during the early 80's.

Here are just a few of the things I'm happy I don't have to revisit, except in memories and photos:

Goldline ropes whose leader fall history was always a mystery. I remember doing a route on Tahquitz one day with a guy I'd met that day, whose goldline was so old and used it seemed as thick as a firehose;

P.A.s (red and black hightop climbing shoes). They looked like climbing shoes, but had the smearing/friction properties of "I can't believe it's not butter." My first pair of EBs (1975) made me feel like Super Fly by comparison. Anyone remember those funky $12.00 Polish tennis shoes (Skats) that were even stickier than EBs? When those wore out (and when the Poles stopped shipping them to us--the Soviet speed climbers got wind of it, no doubt) my friends and I would pour and shape forms of "Shoe Goo" around the forefoot, and enjoy truly sticky rubber for a few days;

1/4 inch bolts with rusty, spinning hangers. I was always happy to find one of these to clip into, but often it only gave the leader psychological comfort to continue;

A small rack of hexes and wired stoppers (as in no SLCDs). Like 1/4 inch bolts, laying one of these in a parallel crack, flaring crack, or pin scar often only gave psychological comfort to continue ("stay...stay..."). This can still be true today with all kinds of pro, but the options before were definitely more limited;

The Swami! What was that about?? Wrapping tubular webbing around your waist three times, then tying it off, and tying into it, seems downright archaic nowadays. And when you fell...it hurt. And if you had no webbing, you'd just wrap the rope around your waist three times and then tie it off. Lots of you out there did big walls with this system--and I salute you. One day, my brother came home with an orange and white harness that actually had leg loops (well, sort of). It was called a "Whillans Harness." It was sort of like an early "Bod Harness," except that there was this one strap that went right up the middle of the crotch. If you fell, it was pretty much "goodbye offspring." I let my brother use the Whillans, and I went back to the Swami.

Well, these are just a few of the things I remember from not that long ago. I'm stoked that climbers out there got creative with safer, more comfortable ways of protecting the climbing experience. It definitely makes it easier to focus on what you're climbing.

Any stories out there of adventures with early climbing technology?

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Jul 14, 2006 - 10:59am PT

I started out in red PA's: there is a friction traverse mid-height on Sundance at Suicide. I had to edge every single move of it, which seemed really weird, because it was clearly a friction problem.

I did most of my harder leads and just about all my best multi pitch 5.11's in a 2" tubular swami and never thought twice about it. I liked the unencumbered feel and climbed that way into the late 80's.

I know have a spankin' new pair of Voyager Dirrectissima's, which is a Kroenhoffer copy and that's what I've been doing backwoods bouldering in. So I am de-evolving!

G_Gnome

Social climber

Tendonitis City

Jul 14, 2006 - 11:52am PT

One of the advantages of a swami that isn't really mentioned is that you have a much smaller tendency to flip upside down at the end of a fall. So no one used to crater their head like you all do now days. And it wasn't like we hung by our waistes on multi-pitch, we had triangle shaped butt bags to sit in - which are actually more comfortable that a harness. Hmmmm, I think I am gonna devolve too and go back to a nice swami and a butt bag! But I am NOT gonna go back to EB's, now a nice pair of Sportiva Tao's would be nice, but not EB's.

mooser

Trad climber

seattle

Topic Author's Reply - Jul 14, 2006 - 12:05pm PT

True enough about the limited advantages of the swami--though I still wouldn't want to devolve that far. And I still have my Collins Butt Bag, though I hang on to it for memorabilia purposes only. I've also still got a couple pairs of EBs that I eventually put some 5.10 rubber on (complete w/barge cement), and left under my front tires for the night. Thought I'd died and gone to heaven the first time I took them out. Also now part of my memorabilia.

eeyonkee

Trad climber

Golden, CO

Jul 14, 2006 - 12:14pm PT

I started off tying into the end of the rope - 3 wraps was the standard. That was the way you did it in 1970. I think I graduated to a plain, wrap-around-3-times swami belt for a year or 2. The big breakthrough was a swami belt with leg loops (duHHH!!!). To tell you the truth, I could just as comfortably climb today with a swami with leg loops as with a harness.

As for PAs. Could there be a more slippery sole?

todd-gordon

climber

Jul 14, 2006 - 12:16pm PT

Tucker Tech STILL only wears a swamii belt....irritating when rappelling, hanging belays, or lowering off of climbs, but he likes it because it punishes his liver, which needs to be punished because it is evil.

Gunkie

climber

East Coast US

Jul 14, 2006 - 12:21pm PT

The Swami! What was that about?? Wrapping tubular webbing around your waist three times, then tying it off, and tying into it, seems downright archaic nowadays. And when you fell...it hurt.

I took two bombers onto a swami belt and it never hurt. Back then you just climbed until you fell. Not too many people on the lead called for tension or told the belayer that they were jumping off. All of the falls I took were pretty much complete surprises. I was bouncing on the end of an old Goldline or just as old kernmantle before I knew what happened. I was also more fit and lighter :) Now I'd probably just bend at the swami and stay that way or snap in half.

Phil_B

Social climber

Hercules, CA

Jul 14, 2006 - 12:26pm PT

Never went the swami route, but I started out making my harness out of 1" webbing. We'd put in a couple of small fig. 8 loops (bunny ears), then loop some webbing through them so that they became leg loops. Finished off with a few wraps around the waist and tied off with a water knot.

It really sucked to hang in that contraption. I bought a regular harness as soon as I found out about them.

My first pair of EB's were totally worn through on the instep so I put them on backwards. My first pair of Fire's made me feel like a Chinese woman with bound feet.

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Jul 14, 2006 - 01:10pm PT

Hey shorty T:
I have a mint pair of Tao's size 38.5
39 or 39.5 is really my size, so I could cut 'em loose.
Not the Rosa, but the Lorica tighties, which I loved.

Yer prolly like a size 37?

G_Gnome

Social climber

Tendonitis City

Jul 14, 2006 - 02:19pm PT

Roy, I am exactly a size 38.5!!!!!! F#cking A, what do you want for them?

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Jul 14, 2006 - 02:48pm PT

'Just emailed you.

mooser

Trad climber

seattle

Topic Author's Reply - Jul 14, 2006 - 06:24pm PT

Stich: yeah, we were always telling people (because this is what we were told) that they had only 5 minutes to extricate themselves before the swami would suffocate them. Never saw anyone suffocate, but it sure felt like I would plenty of times! Of course, if you were following, then the person who was using the sitting hip belay above you probably also had about 5 minutes before their butt slid off the top of the rock. :)

guyman

Trad climber

Moorpark, CA.

Jul 14, 2006 - 06:44pm PT

I really miss my LYCRA from 1986...man that was stylin.

I reckon the porta-ledge is a huge improvement over the "Bat-tent"...

To all of us who learned how to climb in bad shoes....Those shoes made US the expert edging masters that we all are.

Mighty Hiker

Social climber

Vancouver, B.C.

Jul 14, 2006 - 07:05pm PT

When I started in 1971, we had goldline ropes, tied in to the end (bowline on a coil, if we got it right), and mountain boots. And we did body rappels, aka Dulfersitz. (Good subject for another thread.)

A year or two later we got RRs (the blue, stiff, vibram soled shoes), then swami belts. Our first swamis were made of 1" webbing, then 2" seatbelt webbing. I was amazed the first time I saw 2" tubular webbing, probably in Yosemite in 1974, not to mention coloured (non-white) webbing. Heaven knows how many people were strangled by their swamis, or fell out of them, or had them untie. I believe the UIAA did some tests to see how long it took for people in swamis, or Edelrid-style chest harnesses, to lose consciousness. Not long. (I never believed that people would actually use those chest harnesses on their own.)

Once we figured out the carabiner brake (Basic Rockcraft), we used diaper slings to create sit-slings to make it tolerable. Simply a double length 1" runner, sort of belay seat style. They helped a lot.

Belays - well, we got really good at hip belays. One trial we used to subject novices to was to use old ropes, and rig them up with a 100 kg weight. Rope ran from novice to directional at base of cliff, up to top anchors, and back down to the weight. We'd then fire off the rock, with 6 - 8 metres of slack. And the lucky student had to hold it. Sort of like training for self arrest, crevasse rescue, and avalanche rescue - it really makes you pay attention, and learn well. Though we did let the novices wear gloves. After a while we mostly used one if not two carabiners for hip belays, to ensure that the belay worked.

Belaying the Leader says the belayer is supposed to let the rope slip through her/his hands - the consequences are unimaginable.

In 1973 or so, RD shoes (Rene Desmaison) appeared, an EB precursor. They were brown, with a smooth rubber sole. Most disconcerting - received wisdom was that a vibram sole was best. Then in 1974 the EB. (I still have a near-new pair in my size.) The EB is a classic example of the abuse of a monopoly - they dominated the market for ten years, did little to improve the things, and got blown out of the water.

The Whillans harness, which appeared in Canada in 1975, was like EBs - a great improvement, even with its defects. An awful lot of people did hang in them a lot, on walls and belays, and did take a lot of falls - without much damage that I ever heard of. I had some respectable whippers in a Whillans, without apparent damage.

Then Hexcentric, and stoppers. They appeared in Canada in 1973 - there were great ads in Mountain for them. The first hexcentrics were longitudinally symmetrical, with solid walls. The next version, a year or two later, had the walls on all the larger sizes drilled out, to save weight. We tied the knots inside the bigger nuts, to streamline them. The next version was the "Eccentric" hexcentric - longitudinally asymmetrical, or whatever it's called. Offering more possibilities. Then they went with stronger alloy, and didn't drill out the sides anymore.

Eric and Daryl did the first free ascent of the Split Pillar in 1975. I talked with them when they came down, and Daryl was talking about how their hexes were just sitting on crystals. A fairly parallel sided hand/fist crack. Despite all the physics to do with passive camming, the things never seemed all that stable.

Anders

G_Gnome

Social climber

Tendonitis City

Jul 14, 2006 - 07:31pm PT

Yeah, I never graduated to a Whillans harness. We just made better and better swami's. Near the end, just before we added leg loops they were every bit as nice as a harness waist belt is now but the two ends were tied together with a piece of webbing and a water knot. No one trusted buckles back then.

Fortunately I hit just about the time many advances hit the sport and I started climbing with hexcentrics and kernmantle ropes and one inch webbing for swamis. And damn, but I looked GOOD in white painters pants!

mooser

Trad climber

seattle

Topic Author's Reply - Jul 14, 2006 - 08:29pm PT

Ah, S-T, but did you have the obligatory rugby shirt to match?

Chaz

Trad climber

So. Cal.

Jul 14, 2006 - 08:57pm PT

I've climbed on a GoldLine. Did the under-the-crotch, over-the-shoulder rappel on it, too.

Hip belays, yup. Everybody had a scar in the tramp-stamp location from catching lead falls. I still use the hip belay once in a while. You can reel in slack very quickly that way.

PA's? Nope. Those were before my time. I was an EB Baby. Damn, the rubber under the big toe wore out fast.

Small rack of passive pro? We wouldn't have been able to do a hell of a lot if we had waited until we had amassed a decent rack. We were poor n00b kids. I remember what an Austrian Dude in Camp 4 told us; "you have to get used to climbing without protection".

Swammis? Never used one. We tied the diaper-seat out of 1" webbing until we had enough bread to buy a real harness. My first harness was the Chounard one made out of one continious piece of 2" webbing.

I don't miss 1/4" bolts. I remember a hanging belay off one quarter incher, then having to simul-climb up from it because the next pitch was longer than 165'. Welcome To Tuolomne!

We have it so good today, but I had just as much fun when we didn't have a damn thing.

mooser

Trad climber

seattle

Topic Author's Reply - Jul 15, 2006 - 11:24am PT

Chaz--so true! 30 years ago, climbing felt a little more earthy, or visceral, or something. It was addictingly fun, and plenty scary. And yet, I still find myself thinking, "I don't think I'd do this or that climb with EBs and a few hexes nowadays." But I do savor the memories.