Peter Croft is a legendary climber and the author of a book on ultralight alpine climbing. He writes that he usually leaves his harness at home unless he expects extensive hard rock climbing. For general rappelling, he simply uses a double runner (a sewn webbing loop that is 48" long, made from about 10' of webbing). When held from behind, one loop is brought up between the legs and two others from around the waist, hence its name "diaper sling". The three loops are secured with a locking carabiner (I prefer the Petzl Attache- light, compact and has the correct pear shape). As for rope, 7mm perlon accessory cord would be acceptable for single rope rapelling whereas 6mm might suffice for double line rapelling. Instead of the added bulk of a figure 8 or other brake, use a munter hitch. All of this information is available in any general mountaineering book such as Freedom of the Hills. The gear could be purchased at www.rei.com or at mountaingear.com. Of course, proper training in the use of climbing and rappelling gear is the responsibility of the user to obtain and I, Andy Osborne assume no liability or responsibility for the information contained here. It is simply offered as information for discussion. Let me state that this disclaimer is not aimed necessarily at the normal registered posters but at the countless bozos out there that might stumble upon this from a yahoo search and go out and get hurt and sue me or Doug or you. Andy<br><br>