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I acquired this descender used from Paul Hugill in 2007.
Version A is 233 mm. tall, 97 mm. wide, 35 mm. thick, and weighs 531 g. The descender consists of a back plate that supports a rope guide (two bollards and a cover plate) on the right and a central rotating bollard with attached handle extending to the left. The back plate is a 139 mm. tall, 97 mm. wide, subrounded quadrilateral made from5.2 mm. aluminum plate. There is a 15.9 mm. clip-in hole drilled in the lower right side and a second hole of the same size at top center. There are two 16 mm. tall, 16 mm. diameter cylindrical bollards along the left side, covered by a common 84.3 mm. tall, 25.4 mm. wide, 5.0 mm. thick cover plate, all riveted together to form a rectangular rope channel. The bollards have a 43 mm. separation, inside to inside.
The rotating bollard pivots on an axle riveted to the back plate. The axle does not rotate with the handle. The pivot is about 8 mm. above and 40 mm. to the left of the lower rope channel bollard (center to center). The pivoting bollard is a 57.4 mm. diameter, 16 mm. thick chamfered aluminum circular cylinder with a 17.6 mm. (chord length) flat milled at the bottom (6-o'clock position, with the handle pointing upward). The pivot hole lies about 5 mm. below the cylinder's center. There is a 192 mm. long control handle attached to the front of the rotating bollard with three ~5.5 mm. "pop" rivets. The handle is 6.3 mm. aluminum plate with a 126 mm. long plastic handle with three finger grooves slipped on the distal end.
All aluminum components are soft-anodized black. The rear has the following markings in a dot-matrix font:
AML16682 08/01
SWL.200kg @
SERIAL No.91860
TELO.00(44)1626 322200
BSEN341(a)/97/001
The AML is a sturdy descender and the workmanship on the is excellent.
Rigging the descender is simple in concept: simply push a bight in from the right and loop it over the handle. This is rather difficult in practice, since the maximum clearance is only about 9.6 mm., far less than on the similar Fallright Auto Stop DAS.
As one descends, friction on the rotating bollard will tend to rotate the handle upward, and the off-centered mounting will cause the rotating bollard to squeeze the rope against the lower rope channel bollard. Pulling the handle down relieves this pressure, allowing one to descend. Pulling the handle down too far will also slow the descent, but this requires a strong pull.
On rappel, the AML works reasonably well. The handle is somewhat sensitive (but not overly so) and it requires a strong pull, but I found that I was able to control my descents reasonably well. Still, the handle does not come close to any convenient reference surface, so it takes some getting used to. The stop position held my weight (90 kg.), something that many "stop" devices fail to do.
I noticed that the ALM can be rigged up-side down, and it will still work.
The AML is a solid, well-made descender, but it is too heavy for me to use it caving or climbing. The "bigger is better" crowd may like it, and of course industrial users may not be bothered by its weight in the same way we cavers and climbers are.
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I acquired my AML, Version B from Daniel Griffin in 2009.
Version B is 210 mm. tall, 97 mm. wide, 51 mm. thick, and weighs 599 g. The main differences between Versions B and A are as follows:
All aluminum components are soft-anodized black. The front has the AML logo mentioned previously. The rear has the following markings in a dot-matrix font:
AML16234
TESTED TO AML TS 207
SERIAL No.30508 /98
TEL# 01626 322200
Like Version A, Version B is quite well-made. The swing-open front strap makes it much easier to rig Version B than Version A, and eliminating the upper hole in the back plate makes it harder to rig Version B upside-down. Despite the extra weight and bulk, I prefer Version B to Version A.
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