Figure 8 Aluminum desender

The quality seems excellent with it’s heavy duty appearance.

Works great, safety product, great material

This is a great piece of hardware. Bought it on sale as an impulse buy several years ago and haven't been let down. Its a solid and versatile piece of hardware that is a must have for climbers, hikers, and really paranoid people who live in tall buildings.

This extra-large rescue 8 feels really solid. I especially like the large ears, which are ideal for mounting 108" wide aerial silks. Also note most rescue 8s are rated at 40kN but this is higher than that, exceeding our recommended 10:1 safety factor for Weak Link Analysis (WLA) when rigging. The nylon silks will likely break long before this rigging component. The only drawback to this descender for aerial rigging is that it is composed of aluminum. This has two implications. First, aluminum tends to fail unpredictably. Fatigue can only be discerned using a microscope or by an experienced rigger. Whereas steel fatigue is more obvious and it tends to bend as it fails. Again the weak link for aerial silks is the fabric however, so this is unlikely to matter. That said, a conscientious rigger would likely use a steel rescue eight, which are available for sale. The second drawback does matter, which is many mount points and hooks you are likely to encounter are steel. Over time, steel will grind your aluminum rescue 8 and fatigue it prematurely. You can mitigate this by wrapping rubber hose around the rescue eight basket, or introducing a nylon spanset or other non-steel item between your rig and mount. Regardless I recommend keeping a good logbook and retirement plan for this aluminum item. The finish and color on this item are excellent. Black is a great option to help subdue the rigging visually.

Great value, works well. Didn’t rate durability since I’ve only had it a short while, but it is holding up well.

I have been using this for 2 years now and it is the best 8 descender I have found. I am part of a search and rescue team and among the team members there are a lot of types of descender in use, but this one lets you tie off ropes and even pass knots where ropes have been joined with little problem. It is larger and heavier then most so packing it in to the back county is not as easy as smaller descenders but when it comes time to use this is so much better. Often we use large diameter ropes and the larger size of this descender can handle big ropes no problem. Great for use in rope systems, rappels, and belays. it is a bit heavy for traditional climbing or lead climbing but for use as a bottom climbing belay it would be great.

I'm going 5 stars for now despite what I've read somewhere. Had to do with the coating coming off in ships, then affecting the rope during use - i.e causing the strands in the rope to tear over time. I have not used it enough to see this, but I"m grateful that at least I know so I can be aware, Overall, solid piece made for a purpose.

Purchased this for an aerial silks set-up. Looks to be a high-quality product and it set up just fine. I had to get an XL quick link since the descender was too fat to fit through a normal quick link opening. Descender also works perfectly in use with the silks.