UKH

Is there an easy way of doing this?

I tried putting all sorts of krabs into the nose hole and after am immense effort managed to take some pressure of the rope and lower my friend a little.

No doubt this was made sightly harder because the mega jul was at my head height.

Am I missing something obvious, or is it just a consequence of jamming so well on the rope?

Cheers in advance.

As you have discovered using these plates in guide mode works well until you have to lower a climber. Then it becomes more difficult and you have to be very careful not to lose control and drop the second. There are videos on YouTube which show the somewhat convoluted lowering procedures. For this reason I'm personally happier belaying off the harness, it's far easier to lower a climber should you need to. The main advantage of guide mode is bringing up 2 climbers at once and ease of escaping from the system. For me in everyday climbing it just seems a bit complicated.

Didn't read all of your reply but you are now my hero.

You managed to spell lose with only one "o".

Respect.

You win some, .........

Thanks! But I think autocorrect must take most of the credit.

I had the Mega Jul for a while and it was pretty bad to release a climber who couldn’t take their weight of the rope. There are better ones out there (I use the CT one) but not much better. It’s pretty dangerous to do as well as when they release it’s not a gradual thing. Always use a prussic to catch the rope and check out the instructional videos as mentioned.