Anyone seen this before? Is this a recent change? I was always taught to use a seperate braking krab, both by UCET and the army. Also alpine caving techniques seems to be ok with it.

It looks from the diagram that there is a possibility of the stop jamming in the braking krab and there could be a resultant load on the plastic/metal closure of the gate on the stop. I guess if the gate broke you could have the stop come open. Its pretty unlikely IMHO. I always to suggest the braking krab is not attached to the central maillon, but instead is attached to a gear loop or belt to one side as I find that gives a better rope flow while still adding extra friction. In this case the scenario shown cannot occur...

Dave

if your going to use a braking crab , personally you are better off using a petzl freino on your stop

Is it showing it's ok to attach the brake to the oval crab, but not to the maillon?

Or use a Raumer Handy

What they are saying is if you have the breaking krab on the mallion then if a rebelay below you fails it could pull the top of the stop down and inside the breaking krab putting strain on the stop in a way that it was not designed to handle. It does say in the paperwork.

no its not new - i've been saying this for years - and its been on petzl's instructions for years too. Read the fucking manual! RTFM!

because if attached to the krab (rather than the maillon) then it phyically cant fit round and hang up over the top of the stop

Time for a refresher on the manuals then...

Guys, my question wasn't really about whether if it was in the manual, as it clearly is - the picture I posted is taken from the manual.

It was more for me to gauge how many people know about it as I've seen many people doing it with a separate krab on the mallion. I found it worrying that many people do still so it that way. A lad who is fairly new to SRT, initially asked the question as he too had seen individuals doing it that way too.

It has sparked off a debate on the DCC Facebook page with some cavers even defending the method.

you will always get peeps (in every sport) who just get stuck in a bad habit, i used to paddle with a lad who was always using a high brace, until it popped his shoulder out side surfing a stopper.