AJ

I decided to do some checking on my own question. Apparently there is a new test for measuring rope stretch. According to Scott Newell at BlueWater the new method will probably displace the old one in a couple years. Basically the new test is more of a "dynamic" or rapid-load type of test. This should simulate the rope stretch experienced in a real fall more than the old method which used a "static" or very slow pull type of loading. In fact, if you look at PMI or Roca's rope stretch numbers they report both the old and new, but the new number says it is for a first fall on a rope. The amount of rope stretch decreases with each subsequent fall until the rope eventually loses its elasticity. I'll follow up if I get more information.

I would agree that Ruth isn't all that challenging. You should have enough time to easily couple it with Icy Peak, which is a little more interesting, but also easy. Plus, take the time to peer to the east (the Pickets) and soak up a nice bivy looking SW into Nooksack Cirque.

I've never been to these places and a couple are a little over 5000 people, but based on good words from people I know you might want to look into: Farmington, NM Las Cruces, NM Covolo, CA Good luck - let us know where you end up. Sounds like this might a little more real-life than the recent Outside magazine article on the perfect outdoor town.

Has anyone done the routes Nelson describes as the "Northeast Face" or the "Northwest Face Couloir"? Any idea of current conditions?

I was up on the Nisqually last weekend at around 6400' (est.). There are a couple vertical to overhanging sections up to 35' tall. We didn't need to drop into any crevasses - there is plenty of ice fall like glacier ice to play on. Even with the warm temperatures it was fairly good. By early afternoon the sun had warmed everything up so it was less stable. Head up to Glacier Vista and take the moraine trail. You drop down to the lateral moraine. Go up parallel to the glacier until you can see the larger faces to the west. Then cross the glacier to them. Lots of loose glacial rock debris and torrents of meltwater. If you do try toproping anything on the Nisqually - check your anchors (screws) regularly. With the south exposure and intense solar gain we had entire screws melt out in as little as an hour.

I started about 8 years ago. I had always been interested, but never had the money/time. After graduating college I saved up $ and started buying gear and asking around for people to climb with. I ended up enticing my brother to join me and we have done a fair amount together. I even met some of the people on this board through him (how's it going Alex and dps?). Anyway, it has been a great experience and introduced me to tons of great people (including my wife). It is also something special I'll always cherish. I'm not quitting any time soon, but my brother might have to. His eyesight is failing and someday soon he probably won't be out there on lead like he always has been. His new guidedog, Jeep, is pretty cool but I doubt he can belay. Karl is damn tough though and we will climb what we can as long as possible. Of all the things we've done I'll probably remember some of our climbs the most. Carolyn - glad you could join us.

Okay, I'll start by saying I read the various climbing magazines. I noticed something with the last issue of R+I and the Climbing that was just dropped off. Did the UIAA or some other body change the way rope stretch is measured? I thought it was a joke when I saw the BlueWater add (the annoying BW spiderman guy) and the claim of something like 35% rope stretch. I also saw that PMI is now quoting similar numbers, but they say something to the effect of 6% static method and 30+% "new method". Are they doing some kind of fast, "dynamic" test now? Is this a UIAA or Cordage Institute or other test?

I have tried some older (but still plenty beefy) Ushba screws vs. BD Express, old BD, Smiley, and CM Laser screws. The Ushba worked but not as well as the others. I'd be lying if I said the BD Express wasn't a nice screw, but I'm not going to give up my CM Lasers (17 cm) - they thread real nice. I probably wouldn't buy an Ushba unless they have changed the design. The older self-ratcheting model was difficult for me to use.

I'm planning a one-week (9-10 days) roadtrip the first week of September. I'll be travelling with my wife and a couple friends. We are interested in mostly easier/moderate cragging (5.10 and below) and maybe a couple easier long routes/peaks (one day, maybe a short overnight at most). Trad or sport, boulder, whatever - we dabble in all disciplines. Not looking to impress anyone, just have some fun and allow enough time to relax (it is a vacation after all). The general idea is to head north from Seattle (home), get to Canada and head east until the Banff area, then south through northern Idaho and on home. About the only place I'm planning to go for sure is Skaha (never been there) and Banff (never been there either). Actually the only place I've ever climbed in Canada is Squamish. So, any suggestions? Beyond climbing - does anyone have suggestions for "must sees or must do's"?

Has anyone done side-by-side comparisons of the Black Diamond Moonlight, Petzl Tikka/Zipka, and P-T Matrix (?)? From my casual observations I liked the P-T the most, but it would be hard to beat the light output of the Moonlight. The Tikka/Zipka seems okay, but I like more light. I'm leaning toward the Moonlight but was curious if anyone has had much experience with them.

I wouldn't say it was real recent, but I was up there about 3 weeks ago. The road up to Clear Creek is only rough for the last 3 miles, but it is rough. You could drive in with a sedan, but a truck or high-clearance vehicle is preferred due to the deep ruts. Three weeks ago there was snow in the parking lot and spotty snow for the first 1000 feet up the route. I'm sure it has melted out significantly since then.

You can also check out http://www.deceptioncrags.com for an on-line version that is pretty good. Some of the maps are probably better than the book.

I'm fairly familiar with Schoeller's fabrics, but not at all with Malden Mills' Powershield. Can anyone fill me in on the differences? Any experience of a comparative nature? I'm sure there are some opinions...

Since when does Petzl recommend using the Pro-Traxion or Mini-Traxion for toproping? There has been plenty of testing over the years regarding catching falls on ascender type devices. Generally in any type of fall the ascender "teeth" will tear the sheath and potentially do core damage. I'd be surprised if Petzl has changed their recommendation on this. Even if they have - I'm not going to be the first one to try it. It sounds like Charlie Fowler has provided some of the most reasonable and sound advice.

Aliens for small stuff WC Tech Friends for big stuff DMM for in-between and to save $$

There was some discussion of cord and webbing material back a couple months ago. It was focused on cord-o-lette products, but some of it is applicable here. See http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/ubb/Forum9/HTML/000015.html Anyway, I came across a paper that should cause you to think twice about using a double fisherman's knot for higher strength cords. Also, it might be a good idea to replace that type of cord more frequently than every 11 years. To quote from the previous thread: I came across a paper titled "Comparative Testing of High Strength Cord" by Tom Moyer and Chris Harmston. Chris is the QA manager at Black Diamond and Tom is an active climber and mechanical engineer from the Salt Lake City area. Basically they set about testing various cord and webbing materials for use as cord-o-lettes. Their results were pretty interesting. The tensile strength of BD Gemini2 (Technora) and Maxim Spectra A were very high in a slow pull tensile test without any knots/bends. However, once they put a figure 8 knot in the material they decreased quickly. In their testing the hightest strength was Mountain Tools ultratape and then Sterling 7 mm nylon (perlon). Essentially the very stiff cord materials did not perform very well when tied. BD Gemini had a 60% reduction in strength when tied in a figure 8, but 7 mm nylon only had an 8% reduction (so it was still stronger than the technora material). They went on to try double and triple fisherman's knots and found that 7 mm nylon still outperformed technora, spectra and vectran cords (barely outperformed spectra/kevlar -- the Maxim Spectra A). They also found that Double Fisherman's and triple fisherman's knots did very well in Mtn. Tools Ultratape and standard 1" tubular webbing. The testers noticed that kevlar and spectra type materials had a consistent failure mode when tied in a double fisherman's -- the sheath breaks at the knot and the slippery core unties and pulls through the sheath. This didn't happen with a triple fisherman's and the strength of the loop was higher when tied with the triple. Also, in their testing they found that Mtn. Tools Ultratape tied with a standard water knot held almost as much as tied with either a double or triple fisherman's knot which surprised them since they thought it was too slippery to hold knots (they did caution that more testing needs to be done with other brands of slippery webbing). When they tested cord-o-lette stength they concluded that in both static and dynamic (drop) testing that 1" tubular worked best followed by Maxim Spectra A and 7 mm nylon. Finally when they tested cyclical bending of the material they found that the stiffer cords saw significant weakening with increased cycles. 1" tubular, Mtn. Tools ultratape and 7 mm nylon saw almost no loss of strength over 1000 cycles. What Tom Moyer concluded is that stiff cord can make a good chock cord since you desire a stiff material, but they make poor cord-o-lettes since you are never sure how much strength you have lost. He liked using webbing for cord-o-lettes like the "webolette" from Mtn. Tools since it is more compact and performed well, but it wasn't quite as strong has he wanted. However, he seemed to have a stong endorsement for using 7 mm nylon or 1" tubular since they are inexpensive, strong and available almost anywhere. Something to think about next time you are selecting the material for a cord or webbing based system

JIMI - I tested the Technica Altitude in Ouray this year. In the two hours I climbed with them they were warm and dry. They were easy to lace and I had my heel locked down just right and I didn't even crush my foot. They seemed fairly waterproof (of course they were new). It isn't a plastic boot so others looking on this thread might not be interested. Oh, I thought they ran a little narrow but I have am a size 8.5 or 9 and have had my share of fit problems.

The Munter will work for a double rope rapell, but it may be difficult to generate the brake force for a nice controlled descent. As Mr. Glacier noted - it will really twist your rope and produce a lot of heat.

A friend of mine just replaced his standard incandescent bulb on a Petzl Micro with an LED adapter system. He raves about it and I'd have to admit - it does give off adequate light, especially if snow is on the ground. Maybe not a bad idea if you don't want to replace your entire lamp. I believe he said he gets about 30% of the light he used to, but he can extend battery life by over 10 times.

Two weeks ago I did some side-by-side testing in fairly miserable conditions. It was 10F to 20F (max) at Panorama Point (~7400') and snowing a lot (2 feet overnight). Anyway, we had one new-prototype MSR XGK, two standard MSR Dragonfly, and one very old MSR Whisperlite (before they redid the shaker). So, what did we find? The XGK can melt snow and boil water so much faster than the other stoves we eventually turned off a Dragonfly. In fact, with our set-up the Dragonfly stoves were pretty pathetic. Granted - they used less fuel and theoretically could have simmered something, but simmering just wasn't in our plans. The Whisperlite had faster boil times than the Dragonfly, but much longer than the XGK. Like I mentioned - it was the new prototype fuel bottle connection. It seemed to work fine and with a couple refinements it might even be an improvement over the current system. However, I'm getting an XGK regardless. I've had a Whisperlite International (600) for a few years and it has worked well. That was a replacement for my old Peak 1 which eventually became too much of a fire hazard to feel comfortable with.

I'd agree about Potholes (as far as rock climbing goes). Maybe I didn't find the good stuff, but we spent a wasted day exploring the area last Fall. I'm at a total loss why Smoot bothered to include it in his book. Definitely not worth the effort and I found the approach information to be rather lacking. On the bright side - there is some great wildlife viewing.

Schoeller doesn't really get that wet unless you fall into a creek. It does dry pretty quick and is generally hydrophobic. I wore it last year in everything from 10F to 85F and was generally comfortable. I do wear extra insulating layers in the colder weather but the material seems to have a wide comfort range. It breathes well but also blocks wind. I've used it 5-plus days in a row and was pleasantly surprised that it didn't get a "funk" like other synthetic clothes. Like everyone else said - it really does work well and is worth hunting for. I got my Moonstone Contortion pants on REI-Outlet.com last summer for about $60. I've also seen some Schoeller material clothing on Sierra Trading post from time to time. MEC makes some good stuff and it is pretty reasonable (and they will ship that to the US).

7mm cord with a double fishermans knot might give you a cam with less strength than you expect. Work through the numbers if you are considering this.

I didn't get a chance to check out the rock for myself, but I did check out some local guidebooks in the Albuquerque REI. Seems like plenty of moderate to hard multi-pitch granite climbs on Sandia Peak. Should be a lot of fun if you can get into the mountains.

The outdoor writer for the News-Tribune in Tacoma just did a big write-up on climbing Mt. Rainier. I believe he had some original graphics done. It looked good in print. You could probably get some help from him.