Talk:Belaying/Archive 1

Other uses of belay
What about "belay that order"? Isn't that a nautical term too? Or did they just make that up for Star Trek?
 * http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=belay&x=0&y=0 See number 3. --Anonymouses 20:48, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

It is a military term used such as belay the report. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.13.216.35 (talk) 09:55, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Etymology of belay (literally, to make it lay (still)): 'Belay' is simply the archaic/nautical verb for 'stop', as in the shipboard term 'belaying pin'(a short club shaped gunnel pin used to secure rigging lines in tension), in nautical parlance 'belay that'(don't do that), or in climbing, 'belay on' (I am prepared to stop you from falling any further than necessary, based on your anchors/protection & rope stretch.)  In climbing, it is a matter of the stationary 'belayer' controlling the friction (usually not the tension) of the climber's safety line(climbing rope), so that it moves as freely as possible as the leader climbs, but is quickly locked in place if the climber should lose a grip on the rock, and begin to fall, and is quickly stopped by the tension that forms in the safety rope. In top-roping, that 'fall' can be a matter of inches, but in a 'leader fall', because the climber is usually above the last anchor placement by up to a few yards, (s)he will fall that far past that anchor before the rope can catch the falling climber. The belayer usually does nothing but closely monitor the climbers movements & control the friction of the rope thru his 'belay' device. The lead climber has some control of the climbing tension of his belay thru route selection & anchor placement.--Boldklub-PJs (talk) 03:48, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

This article so far (as of September 2, 2009) is very incomplete
I am not a climber but am translating a text about belaying. I have spent hours searching the web for information about how belaying is done. By pulling together partial insights from different websites, and thinking about what is physically possible, I think I have groped my way to a non-climber's understanding of how belaying must work. As far as I can see, this Wikipedia article (as of September 2, 2009) fails to mention some absolutely basic and fundamental points. ''[Note added by me a few hours later: I have since discovered more info, so the following will need some adjustment! - see my reply to Ozhiker's reply.]'' I suggest the following overview would be very helpful near the beginning of the article (IF IT IS CORRECT, of course; I am putting it here on this discussion page in the hope that someone will check it) :

The purpose of belaying is to catch a climber, tied to a rope, if he falls. The basic principle is to have a companion at the other end of the rope ready to jam the rope by friction as soon as he sees the climber fall.

The commonest layout for belaying is that a rope is tied rigidly to the climber, runs up to some sort of fixed point at the top of the climb, and then runs down to a second person called the belayer who stays at the bottom watching, pulling down the slack as the climber climbs, and ready to jam the rope by friction as soon as he sees the climber fall. The rope is basically following an upside-down V.

Note that belaying in this layout, where the belayer is below the climber, cannot normally be done on a virgin climb because someone must first have gone up to the top of the climb by some means, carrying the rope, and passed it around some reliable fixed point such as a tree or rock or man-made anchor or pulley.

Another layout is to have the belayer make his own unassisted way to the top of the climb and let down one end of the rope to the climber. The belayer again stays put, watching the climber, and is ready to apply the friction to the rope the moment he sees the climber fall.

(I found the foregoing information NOWHERE on the web or in this Wikipedia article. If I am right, then the very essence of what belaying is is not mentioned on any of the websites I have visited! That in itself is strange and makes me doubt my understanding of belaying. And one more point puzzles me: if I am right in saying that belaying with the inverted-V layout of the rope is impossible on a virgin climb, then its only purpose must be training or practice. I would have thought that someone on at least one website would have mentioned this. So am I wrong? Can belaying with this layout be done the first time a climb is attempted? How? By throwing a loop of rope up to the anchor point until it hooks over it?)

The belayer stays at the bottom. If the climber starts to fall, the belayer makes a slight adjustment of the rope which causes the rope to slow and jam by friction, bringing the falling climber to a controlled stop. The belayer must therefore pay attention at all times to the climber until the climber has reached the top.

The article already discusses various belaying devices. What it still does not do, though, is give a clear diagram of how the belay device is attached to the belayer (not to the climber - it is worth stressing this since it is not obvious), how the rope is passed around and through the belay device, and how the belayer holds and operates the two ends of the rope. --UBJ 43X (talk) 12:19, 2 September 2009 (UTC)


 * You are right - the article does need some work, so please go ahead. The two types of belay you refer to are Top roping and Lead climbing. --Ozhiker (talk) 13:05, 2 September 2009 (UTC)


 * I've now found more info on the web (primarily at ) which shows that my understanding of belaying was incomplete - it is possible to climb a virgin route with a belayer at the bottom. The climber fixes things called (I think - I'm not sure of their name) "protections" into the rock face as he goes, and clips his rope into them. Then he climbs a bit higher. If he falls, he will fall past the last protection and carry on falling as far as the unclipped end of the rope allows. Meanwhile the belayer will have seen this and applied friction to the rope so that the rope is brought to a controlled stop. The climber is now hanging from the last protection.


 * I won't try to amend the actual article until I have absorbed this information better.--UBJ 43X (talk) 14:15, 2 September 2009 (UTC)


 * I have now been bold and inserted what I hope is a correct description of the path of the rope and how it is arrested. As I said above, I have never climbed, so I hope my insertion is correct. My understanding is largely based on . What I have not yet been able to elucidate is how the metal loops (as I called them, for the sake of understandability) are fixed into the rock. I believe I read somewhere that they are normally fixed in permanently by an earlier climber, and the rope is not inserted directly through these metal loops but through clips clipped onto them, which can be removed afterwards. But how on earth anyone climbing a rock face can fix metal loops into the rock so securely that later climbers can fall past them and swing from them suddenly (the jerk in a fall must create a really enormous strain on the loop), I can scarcely imagine. This point is one of the many points that writers on climbing seem not to think of mentioning; like writers on jet engines who explain that it is the turning of the turbine that draws in air but never explain how the turbine itself is started. --UBJ 43X (talk) 02:03, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Have you been able to learn more about protections? They are all ways of attaching the belay rope to the rock face. Pitons are probably the oldest kind. More recent innovations include bolts with hangers, nuts, wedges, and cams. Bolts are usually installed on established routes, while nuts, wedges and cams are usually temporary and can be installed as the lead climber goes up the face. The rope is attached to the protection with a carabiner.——Davidkeeth (talk) 19:30, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Gender Neutral Language
This article consistently refers to both the climber and belayer by using masculine pronouns. In real life, both men and women participate in both climbing and belaying. The language of this article should be modified. Rhall28 (talk) 11:36, 8 February 2015 (UTC)
 * There is no neutral pronoun in English for individuals. The masculine pronoun refers to both male and female persons! 95.91.228.8 (talk) 09:40, 25 December 2016 (UTC)

Diagrams needed
... of how the rope is threaded through the belaying devices 82.31.207.100 (talk) 20:55, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Double Figure Eight Knot
Just to change the knot from "rewoven" to "double", it is more universally used. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sschmi14 (talk • contribs) 23:03, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Liability??
I always worry about the climbing pages on wikipedia. Every single climbing book (either instructional or guide book) that I have ever picked up has had some warning on the inside cover that "reader assumes risk." I do bite my fingernails sometimes thinking, "what happens if someone reads this page and does the typical American thing, which is to say they take no responsibility for their own stupidity and end up killing themself or someone else following the information here, and then try to blame it on Wikipedia?" I guess it's kind of a silly concern, but maybe some kind of general disclaimer about the accuracy of the information and the self-assumed risk by applying information would be prudent? Giminy 05:36, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Note the Disclaimers link at the bottom of each page. Rwxrwxrwx 07:20, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, but... I just removed an image that could easily misled someone (although probably a lot of guys are doing just that). One absolutely must have belay gloves and something with long sleeves on to do it. Assuming that was the simplest old-fashion belay (the image does not show everything) and it would be done in real conditions when the climber really fell down, the worst case scenario would be the belayer is incapabale of holding the rope, and the climber dies. My very best wishes (talk) 18:34, 25 June 2020 (UTC)