Sorry guys, I have bad news...
@Brocky has been reported missing, this might be his last post. Police reports say it looks like he left in a hurry, but had time to type a note that reads: "Dear arborists, I was wrong. Simple and inexpensive are just pipedreams. Keep buying pulleys... The expensive ones work best."
Kidding of course, but I've bought into all the hype and have a stable of fancy pulleys now, and here we are going back to some of the first stuff I learned, using a boat snap to tend a Blake's hitch on the tail of my line.
I want to also applaud how open to new ideas and stuff everyone is. It seems like at one point in my learning I was somewhere that people basically trashed anything that wasn't ANSI/industry standard for tree work. I almost felt embarrassed to use screw locking carabiners.
Its nice to also find so many guys not only sympathetic to guys like me who started climbing in a rock harness and a Blake's hitch, but who started similarly themselves.
Cheers guys, and happy climbing!
(Ok back to turning the industry upside down)