Garda hitch
Garda hitch is an improvised unidirectional device, rigged of two idetical carabiners. It's called after the inventor, the Italan alpinist and inventor Franco Garda.
This is a simple and efficient one way device. It's been recommended by the CAI, the Italian alpine club, and was thoroughly tested by numerous clubs and by the Italian army alpine units. The Garda hitch is a relatively new hitch. It was introduced in 1970, and was immediately accepted.
The biggest pro of the Garda hitch is that as soon as you stop poulling, it stops. There is no slack in the system.
One repeating argument agains it, is that it looks nice and simple in the drawing, but in real lofe, the two biners rarely stay parallel to one another, and the whole rig looks unconvincing. In controled tests, a 40kg load was repeatedly hauling|hauled]] and not even once was there any slippage or failure. The experiments were done using an 11mm rope, and repeatd with both oval and D shaped biners.
The real con of a garda hitch is that it's hard to set on a loaded rope. In that case, you need to set tht parael biners a part, and thread the ropes between them. this requires a certain amount of skill.
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על חבלים וקשרים, אנדריאה ענתי ומיכה יניב, 2005, פרק 15
Contributions to this page were made by Mica Yaniv and others...
