Posted by jimjuliem on 7/18/2008
I just finished Peter Potterfield's book called "In The Zone". It is really three epic survival stories of mountanieering. I recommend the book. It appears well researched and well written, much of it very well written. But one thing he didn't cover well was exactly why he fell climbing chimney Rock, or more accurately, why the belay didn't stop him before it got to the end of the rope. His belayer was using a new device he called a "Tuber" and I wonder if that was the problem. what is a Tuber anyway? Are they safe?
voltigeur says:
I’m not familiar with this particular accident. The devise I know as a “tuber” is quite old it dates back to 1989 ish maybe 91. It is the precursor to today’s ATC. I still have one and when we were belaying off figure 8’s it was an advancement.
One of the problems with it was remembering which way to turn it. There was a narrow side when this was up the devise was much tighter, with the wide end up it was much looser. You have to remember this was in the days when most ropes were 11mm or greater. If you were using a thinner rope and had the wide side turned to the top, or were inexperienced with the device you would not have a lot of strength on the belay and it could get away from you.
While the tube design eventually became the dominant style of devise the first one was sketchy.
climbingtrash says:
Here are a couple of pics I found online of tubers...
The device on the left is a stitch plate.
The Tuber was the precursor to the ATC and I don't think they where a very popular device. I never used one but did see them around in the early nineties but never heard of how safe or unsafe they where.
woodchuck07 says:
Got one of those tuber things. Only 10mm or less would fit in it. It's not a rope wrapped around a sweet potato, that's for sure.
Sticht plates, with a spring, are totally awesome. I still have 3 and use them. Nothing feeds rope more smoothly than a spring sticht plate. No lock off in design, you must tie off or wrap it around something to hold tight a long time. But it was very dynamic in holding a fall.
Didn't we have a 'history' item long ago posted here about old equipment?
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