Hair in Rack

[self-deleted_user]

For me so far what is worse than hair is gloves. My hands are TINY. I can't tell you already just in practice how much paying very close attention at all times to my rack has saved my fingers from getting caught up in it when gloves get sucked in. I hate it. Lock off...climb up...extract glove, re-rappel. At least I'm getting practise with weird situations while in a garage/in a tree/on a short cliff? LOL

I think I finally found a pair of tight fitting gloves. I don't see how ya'all can do it with the standard gloves out there. My fingers are small, and there is always a bunch of extra at the tips of my fingers, but I can't get small gloves because then they don't fit onto my hands. I dunno, I htink my hands are proportional and looking at my fingers they don't look short or extra small or anything, but finding gloves is a PITA. Most of them are so bad that I can't even manuplate the vertical gear at all because the fingers are too damn bulky so I can't easily even pull off an ascender or thread a rack or anything like that which all requires some form of finger dexterity which you can't have when your fingers are twice their size due to extra glove!

While they aren't ropework gloves, I found a pair of small ladies gardening gloves that have a leather palm and fingers and the back of the hand is a stretchy poly material. Because of the stretchybit, they fit snug on my hand & fingers and so far no problems with those. Someone should design actual ropework gloves for small hands and skinny fingers!

[Chads93GT]

I don't see how ya'all can do it with the standard gloves out there.

My gloves fill the PMI gloves I use perfectly and they are very low profile. I have never had a problem with them jamming up. I don't use thick bulky gloves from the hardware store becuase I can't do ropework with them on. I have to take them off and then they risk being dropped. I rarely have to take my PMI gloves off.

[graveleye]

Petzle makes an extra small rappelling glove. The small in both PMI and Petzle was just too big for my wifes little hands. The extra small works just fine for her.

You have to look patiently for the extra small gloves though. They don't make as many of them as they do the other sizes.

[self-deleted_user]

Petzle makes an extra small rappelling glove. The small in both PMI and Petzle was just too big for my wifes little hands. The extra small works just fine for her.

You have to look patiently for the extra small gloves though. They don't make as many of them as they do the other sizes.

Yeah smalls just don't fit right. I was not aware of extra-smalls.

Chad - I never wore bulky hardware store gloves. I was trying to use PMI gloves. And then a Petzl pair. Both are huge FAIL.

I also have thought about checking out a saddlery or something - as gloves for riders come in smaller sizes and are more hand-fitting from what I remember from when I was like, 10. So if I could have smaller hands than now and have riding gloves that fit, I'm sure I could find some for me now.

[Chads93GT]

I see people wear baseball batting gloves for rappelling/vertical. they arent thick but they will work. bit expensive for my taste.

[dfcaver]

Same story with my wife; long hair sucked right up into the rack; she tried to free herself by descending a bit more, and realized quickly that that wasn't the answer. Fortunately, we had another rope rigged, and another member got down to her and was able to cut the hair, freeing her.

On a related incident, my sister leaned out of a ferris wheel gondola to wave at friends, catching her hair in the shaft; as the wheel ascender, her hair began to wrap up as well. Her screaming caught the attention of the worker, who stopped the ride; climbing up the side, he was able to cut her hair free. That was a greasy mess....I've noticed ferris wheels seem to have guards at that "pitch point" now.

[chh]

On small hands. My wife can't wear any of the gloves sold locally, including the petzl XS and such. We ended up finding a pair in the Tetons that fit her, well, like a glove, but we paid 65 dollars for them! I believe they were gloves for horseriding. I don't regret it though. Especially when she is belaying my fat A$$ on our skinny doubles.
It took years to find a pair that fit. In the meantime, for people with small hands, sometimes customized fingerless can be the way to go.