Mechanical Advantage in Self Rescue

Activity Notes

• Mechanical Advantage in Self-Rescue
• Sunday Oct 9
• 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
• Mazamas Mountaineering Center

We’ll cover the theory and hands-on practice of 2:1, 3:1, and 6:1 mechanical advantage systems, focusing on building them with a minimal amount of gear in the scenarios of crevasse or rock rescue. If you have some experience in this, great; if you have zero, that's cool too, you'll learn a bunch.

Stuff to bring: harness, a few carabiners, a few slings/runners, friction hitch/prusik loop. (If you have any fancy stuff like a Tibloc and/or Traxion pulley, bring it too.) This will be "ground school", so no helmet or rock shoes are needed.

If you don’t have this gear, no problem, please come anyway, we can share.

If you want to learn more about mechanical advantage, have a look at the MA section of my website, Alpinesavvy.

Here are some recommended articles to read before class. Having a basic understanding of these will make our class time be more effective.

• Introduction to MA systems

• Overview of a simple pulley system

• A few basic questions and answers about MA systems

• 6:1 compound pulleys in the real world

Hope to see you,

John