GroundquestMSA wrote:If I ever find myself at the bottom of a pit with no gear at all...
I actually found myself in exactly that situation many years ago, in a little cave in eastern Oklahoma. We were attempting to do a loop trip, which had at one point a short rappel, for which we'd brought a similarly short bit of rope (Goldline, if I recall correctly). We get to the drop, anchor the rope, and I body-rap in (dulfersitz). Of course, turns out this wasn't on route, and it was a blind pit. We discussed options (since the drop was only 30-40 feet or so, we could communicate ok), and I decided I really didn't want to be hauled out by three guys basically just pulling me up hand over hand.
Fortunately, I had about 10 extra feet of rope on the bottom, and - equally fortunate - Goldline is fairly supple. So - I rapped out. Really. I tied an ascender knot (helical, probably) in the the tail of the rope, with a footloop tied in 4-5 ft below. Then, I wrapped myself back into the standing line in my dulfersitz. Getting back up was pretty easy: sit in the dulfersitz, move the knot up the rope, stand up on the footloop, take the slack out of the dulfersitz, sit back, repeat.
If I'd had a bit more rope, I could have tied a waist loop in the tail below the helical and provided a bit more security. There's always something of a risk of falling out of a body rappel, and the step where I took the slack out of the rope, whilst holding myself up on one foot, could have been a bit sketchy. Also, while this worked great in Goldline, I once tried it in some stiff PMI pit rope, and couldn't get the knot to hold at all. So, in those situations, you might have to resort to shoelaces.
swm