Suspension Bondage Is Dangerous

We love suspension bondage and we’re excited to share it with you. We want to be very clear, however, about the risks involved.

1. Suspension bondage involves unavoidable risk. Like rock climbing, suspension is a risky activity. Good preparation and training can reduce your risk, but even if you do everything right there is still a chance that you may be injured or killed, or that you may injure or kill another person.

2. We don’t have all the answers. Unlike rock climbing, suspension bondage has no professional standards bodies and no expert consensus about best practices. This book is based on years of study, practice, and consultation with outside experts. Nonetheless, you should be aware that suspension is still a developing field, and our understanding of the best way to do things is still evolving.

3. You can’t learn suspension from a book. The only safe way to learn suspension is to work with a qualified instructor or mentor. This book is a valuable adjunct to expert instruction, but not a substitute for it. Without a skilled teacher to guide and evaluate you, you cannot learn suspension without placing your partner in tremendous danger.

4. Don’t get ahead of yourself. Suspension is fun and exciting, and you will likely be tempted to rush ahead and try activities that you aren’t yet ready for. We can’t stress enough the importance of proceeding slowly and methodically, and always working within your skill level.

5. Always use good judgment. Your best defense against mishap is your own common sense and good judgment. Always be mindful of what you’re doing, and err on the side of caution.

Your partner is placing tremendous faith in your competence and judgment. If you are careless or overly ambitious, they are likely to pay a heavy price for your foolishness. Make sure that you are worthy of their trust.

Suspended Animation accepts no responsibility for any injury or death which may occur as a result of the activities described in this book. By reading this book, you agree to take full responsibility for your actions and their consequences.

Basic Rigging

Attaching the Line

Begin by attaching the vertical line to your gear bag. As with almost all of our techniques, you’ll be working with the bight of a doubled rope. Using a doubled rope increases the strength of the system as well as allowing you to place rope twice as quickly.

You’ll attach the rope to your gear bag using a knot called two half hitches. Note that while this is a strong and secure knot, it tends to jam under load. It is therefore not a good choice for tying off the vertical line, so we’ll finish with a different knot (the wrap and tuck with a square knot).

Attaching the line

1

Pass the bight of the vertical line through any convenient attachment point on your gear bag. When rigging a person, you would typically attach the vertical line by passing it under a body harness.

We use MFP rope in most of our illustrations because it photographs better than hemp or Regatta Braid. We don’t, however, recommend this rope for most suspension applications.

2

Tie a half hitch by wrapping the working end around itself.

3

Snug the hitch into place.

4

Tie a second half hitch in the same direction as the first hitch.

5

Snug the second hitch and dress the knot.

Inspect the knot, making sure that the half hitches are snug and tidy and the standing end passes straight through the middle of the knot without bending.

6

Lock the knot by passing the standing end through the bight. This makes the knot completely bulletproof: so long as the standing end is under load, the knot cannot come undone. You should always lock your critical lines, but this step is optional for non-critical lines.

To make it easy to see what’s going on, we’ve made the bight in this picture bigger than it would normally be.

How big should the bight be?

Locked

Locked: the bight is as small as possible.

Critical lines should always be locked to guarantee that the knot won’t slip and fail. Make the bight as compact as possible: a small bight is less cluttered and has less room to slip.

Note that in our illustrations, we sometimes leave a large bight for visual clarity.

Unlocked

Unlocked: leave between 2 and 4 inches of bight.

If you like, you can leave your non-critical lines unlocked. Unlocked lines are less secure but are faster to tie.

The rope left over when you snug a knot is called the tail. Less than two inches of tail is dangerous: the tail may pull through the knot under load, causing it to fail unexpectedly. On the other hand, too much tail looks sloppy and can get in the way. A good rule of thumb is to leave two to four inches of tail.