Disabled Climber?

Hi everyone,

There hasn't been much activity here so I thought I would try to generate some.

I have a friend who was injured while serving in the Army over in Iraq. He is not able to walk or use his left hand much. What I was wondering is, how should I get him climbing? What saddle, equipment, technique should he use?

He is able to do the leg press, bicycle and a few other exercises at a gym. Also he rides a four wheeler and horses.

The main reason I want to try and get him climbing is that he is jealous of my ability to climb. I believe tree climbing could give him a very liberating experience.

So far I have thought about a saddle with a batten seat. Also I have thought about the yo yo/RAD system since it is easy to switch over to descent.

When I set up for my wife, I use the yo yo on the working end of a DRT. This makes it real easy for her to pull (6:1) on the rope. Also, in this config when she descends the grigri is extremely forgiving- you almost need to feed it the rope so there is less danger for unexpected or jerky drops. It works well, although you can imagine the amount of rope you need to pull to get yourself up.
Hope this helps and please - give your friend our thanks for his service.

Hey HUK,

That sounds like a good set up (6:1), but I am having a hard time picturing it. Could you post some pictures? I don't think the amount of rope that he would have to pull through would bother him much. Just being in a tree wold make him happy.

Well, I have to go take my friend to the gym. It is time for his work out. Thanks for the good advice.

Here you go. As I'm looking at it now, I was wrong - it's only 4:1, but that's still pretty good.

Edit 12/23/11 - Looks like I was wrong a second time (two wrongs made a right). According to another post "Theoretical RADS Ratio" the RAD system is 3:1 if the climber is pulling himself up. So if the system is rigged as in the picture then it is theoretically 6:1.



HUK

We use a set up for our facilitated climbs called the "Super System". That would work well for what you want. It's similer to what HUK uses. I'm not tech savy at all, but I'll set it up and try to post a pic or vid one way or another so you can see it. It's the same rigging we use for pulling on heavy butt logs at work. The nice about the S.S. is that it uses a self tending hitch. Perfect for your buddies current one handedness.

I think that any saddle would do. Preferably a New Tribe or Petzl Sequoia type with leg pads, as opposed to a butt strap that may slide up over the butt and become another waist belt. Also,...get a chest harness to help keep him upright. These are nice to have on hand even for your own use. Great for tree napping without having to set up a tree boat. Very portable.

Hope this helps. And be carefull.

Thank you Huck for posting the picture. I will save up and get some gear to take my friend climbing. Hopefully someone can take some pictures and I will post them, if he allows.

I look forward to the picture or video 2chops. I think the chest roller will be a must, in fact I will probably get a harness with a dorsal attachment as well. That way I can have a separate line attached to him in case he gets tired and needs to be let down remotely.

Treezybreez wrote:

I have a friend who was injured while serving in the Army over in Iraq. He is not able to walk or use his left hand much. What I was wondering is, how should I get him climbing? What saddle, equipment, technique should he use?

He is able to do the leg press, bicycle and a few other exercises at a gym. Also he rides a four wheeler and horses.

The main reason I want to try and get him climbing is that he is jealous of my ability to climb. I believe tree climbing could give him a very liberating experience.

Are his legs strong/functional enough to power his climbing with footloops? Guessing yes since he can ride a bicycle or leg press.

If so I agree that a chest roller is key. It will allow him to maintain a vertical position on rope without relying on his arms.

I injured my left shoulder (I'm a lefty) and have many months to go before it will be functional again. I can't climb using my typical methods. I made an adaptive SRT system that's working very well for me. I'm using footloop and Pantin to rope walk but a double footloop on the ascender would work very well for your climber.

The one caveat with SRT (or DRT for that matter) is he can't belay himself on descent. You can do that from below his position in the tree. For example if he's descending on a Grigri you can provide belay with your hand on the rope. Very good communication and practice low and slow is important to perform safely. I do this frequently with new SRT climbers. I lanyard them in and do the switchover to rappel mode for them, then get 15 feet or so below them and belay. When they reach me I move down again and repeat.





In this photo I'm making zero effort to hold myself vertical, my right arm is moving the ascender up, not holding me up.

-AJ

Nice setup HUK, that's a pretty strong approach with fairly minimal gear.

Depending on what type of harness... on a New Tribe for example the static leg of the DRT system can be tied directly to the delta on the harness so the Yo-Yo side has the biner all to itself. I use a double overhand noose tied over a plastic rope thimble when I attach directly to the delta.

Or another approach is attach the Grigri/rig or whatever you're using directly to the delta and anchor the static leg with a carabiner, that makes it easier to advance the rope if the climber wants to re-pitch up in the tree.
-AJ

moss wrote:

Or another approach is attach the Grigri/rig or whatever you're using directly to the delta and anchor the static leg with a carabiner, that makes it easier to advance the rope if the climber wants to re-pitch up in the tree.

Missed a minor (not) detail... Only a Petzl Rig or Petzl ID can be attached directly to the delta on an NT harness and still allow the rope to installed or taken off the device. Grigri or Eddy has to be taken on or off the carabiner or delta when installed on or taken off the rope.
-AJ

Moss,
Thanks for the feedback,
Yes, she uses a New Tribe, we just got it so I haven't figured out the best way to tie into it. I've been using my HUK-YO for a little while and I set it up ahead of time so she can just walk up and clip in. I would rather use two biners to allow a little more give between the Rig and standing end, but I don't like the clanking.

Treezy,
I can say that the new tribe (vi-special) gives a more 'secure' feeling when I wear it because the back pad is very wide and rides high (at least in the few times I used it). So it hugs more of your body than belt line. This also helps hold you upright easier. Of course this all depends on how you set up the harness, and I'm new to New Tribe.

Wow! thanks for posting the pictures Moss. A chest roller is definitely the ticket. In response to your question about My friend's ability to use his legs; he has a brain injury that caused him to loose certain abilities. He is able to support himself on parallel bars, but his feet do not lay flat on the ground they force him on tipi toes.

After thinking about some of the difficulties to be overcome I realized that if My friend is on an SRT system then there won't be a need for a dorsal attachment. I will make sure to buy some extra long rope and use a ground level anchor that can double as a belay device. In the event that he needs to descend but can't, we can lower him without even needing to detach him from the system.

Huck, I have been thinking that a New Tribe harness would work well for him because it doesn't have a floating bridge. Even though I love the floating bridge on my Petzle saddle, he might have a difficult time keeping his body from tilting side to side.

Treezybreez wrote:

Huck, I have been thinking that a New Tribe harness would work well for him because it doesn't have a floating bridge. Even though I love the floating bridge on my Petzle saddle, he might have a difficult time keeping his body from tilting side to side.

I think that's correct, NT harness will support him much better, too much side-to-side mobility will not help him. He'll get much better comfort with the NT legstraps as well.
-AJ

Well, success at last! Today my friend Jon climbed unaided approximately 50'-60'up a beech tree. I used a pinto pulley for the anchor point and that was attached to a rope that went over several natural crotches down to a ground anchor. I set up a ddrt system through the Pinto for Jon while I had a separate system for myself to climb on. I also did some modifications to the New Tribe harness that Jon used and I will post some pics of that if anyone is interested.

Although I forgot my camera, Jon's mom took a few pictures before her camera battery died. So I will hopefully post them soon.

Thanks to all who gave me advice. I wish you could have seen how excited he looked before the climb and how satisfied he looked afterwards. He said "I feel awesome".

Here is a link to some pictures of the climb. Picasa

You are such a big hearted person to take a disabled person high up into a tree. It's a reflection of who you are as a person to figure out a system for a disabled climber. It takes a lot of figuring out to get the system right.

Treeman