Retrosaurus

Sounds like you need Priapism's input here. He is an expert in this area.

Lummox, you sound pretty ignorant. If you are not falling, you are not pushing it. Falling is a good thing, in that you are pushing yourself to grow expanding your comfort zone and learning how to fall safely, etc. Tele, I vote for nuts. Their security depends on simpler, more predictable physics. Although the best placement depends on what the rock gives you to work with, of course. As a side note, I am willing to bet that the cam placements that you have had fail, were small cams. Their expansion range is smaller corresponding to a smaller margin for error in placement. It helps to place them in the narrower half or their range and to set them with a really goood tug or two ( as you would a more marginal nut placement) in the expected direction of loading.

Climbed OS on SCW Friday. ~3 hrs. Rained from the 3rd pitch to the top. Drenched, but warm and windless. Helps to be stupid.

Meaning that you could not clip a bolt and be toproped through the crux moves? You had to make hard moves above your protection? I am so sorry. Are you sure climbing is the right sport for you?

Over-protect. When you are not sure about what is and isn't safe you need to do what you can to make sure that your protection is good. Compensate with redundancy. Put in multiple pieces at any tricky spot. Do not run it out. Always think about what would happen if the last piece fails. And if the last two pieces fail will I still avoid a groundfall (ledgefall). It has always seemed the only sane way to do it until you gain enough experience to acquire real judgement. Even so, the most experienced will get fooled and step over the line once in a while. You just have to do everything that you can to stay alive while you accumulate experience. If Goran Kropp had put in three pieces of gear at the crux he would be alive and uninjured today. I agree 100%. You are fortunate to have such solid mentors. Probably the most neglected skill. And will go a long way toward keeping you alive. With practice it is much easier than climbing up. Much less strenuous. You never have to do a pull-up. The only time I met Scott Backes was in February '96. It was bitter cold and he, Jay Smith and Steve Gerberding had beaten us to the start of Oh Le Tabernac. They were waiting for the sun to move on to the ice so that it would be less brittle. Backes and Smith soloed side by side and Gerberding followed. We climbed Tabernac while they went on to climb one of the nasties on the right side of the upper bowl.

That crack is so straight and vertical that you don't even have to add a sling to cams if you are careful as you climb past them.

Can I do it safely? What happens if I do fall? Is the pro right there and the terrain steep enough that no injury is possible? Where is the next opportunity to rest or place gear? Can I put in 4 or 4 pieces of gear at the crux? Can I down climb to a rest if I cannot make it safe enough or am I going to get suckered into a dangerous runnout? Regardless of what is happening internally, if you can make it safe, then it's time to go for it. Learn how no not die. Dying is bad form. Everything else is OK. You are the only one keeping score. Make it safe and send it.

Closed for raptor nesting until later in the summer.

I have two pickle forks and so don't need a partner with one. And who needs partners just to go climbing?

Sunday afternoon, I climbed about 20 pitches on Castle Rock. Didn't need no guidebook.

The hole has always remained in apparently good shape. But I don't replace bolts. I remove pussy convenience bolts when the rock provides enough natural features to protect the climb.

A few really thick washers and oversized hex nuts that will slip over the stud without having to thread them. This necessitates removing the hanger and putting the nuts and washers on and then replacing the hanger to continue driving the bolt out. You need to not mangle the outermost threads too much. If you made or found some spacers with a slot cut in them so they could be slipped in horseshoe-style under the hanger, that would be much simpler. A pair of visegrips can be handy to hold onto the stud while trying to thread get the nut on or off to insert the spacers.

Auto parts store, tie rod separator or ball joint separator, I cannot remember which is smaller, but the smaller one works better. Get two and drive them in from opposite sides. Get a heavy hammer, or two. Synchronizing blows from opposite sides is the most effective way to create straight pull out force and avoid breaking off the bolt. Handy to have spacers to place under the bolt hanger after driving a pair of opposing forks to the hilt as this usually does not pull the bolt far enough to free it from the rock. This will almost always cleanly remove a 3/8" wedge type anchor. Can work on 1/2 " also but they are a lot more work and break off much more often. When they do break off you have to drive the remainder back into the hole. The 5- piece or 7-piece or what ever they are that have the machine-bolt head as opposed to the machine-nut head can just be disassembled and the innards fished out with a wire. ( Dru)

The new book will be hopelessly inacurate after I warm up the pickle forks and remove all the bolts beside gear placements.

The boulderer has to get a climber to tie the knot, eh?

I am so stupid. I use the butterfly coil (from either both ends or the middle ,which ever is handier). I never restack the rope but by keeping a finger between the strands as I feed the coil so that they stay parallel in the coil rather than wrapping around each other and unwrapping and laying out the coil carefully, making sure not to start out with the strands wrapped around each other, I very rarely have tangles. I will stop doing this immediately and use Catbird's technique because that way it will take twice as long.

We found a couple of French coils beside our car on the icefield parkway after finishing Polar Circus. Mark stepped in one of them and then spent 15 minutes scouring with sticks and snow to get it out of the cleats in his mtn boots before he could get into the car. Fuking French

One of the best is often a nut in a horizontal crack; often completely stable against an upward or downward pull, and often better than a cam. Also, slinging the multi-directional anchor short will go a long way toward minimizing the possibility of zippering other pieces.

Several peeople have advocated practicing easy aid or weighting placements so as to see what actually happens when they are loaded. In my experience this is not as pertinent as one would expect. The problem is this: In a lead fall the dynamic forces placed on each placement bear very little resemblance to loading each placement independently with bodyweight. First, only the topmost piece will recieve a downward load. Second, it will be shockloaded; usually with more force than you would generate by bounce testing. (impact force) Third, as the rope tighten on all the zigs and zags created by the placement of anchors not perfectly in line, vector forces create outward and sideways loads on many placements. Fourth, as the falling climber begins to be caught by the belay and the rope elongates, traveling upward under tension through every placement (except the last one), an actual upward loading can often occur on many placements, mimicking the upward yank that is so effective for removing nuts. Fifth, if one placement fails, all the dynamics change and a second and different shockload is applied to the whole system. Don't get me wrong; you will learn from aiding. But what make a good aid placement is a lot different from what makes good free climbing protection.

I have mentored probably 20-30 beginners, so far.

That was good advice; much better than Aplinwannabe's advice. You cannot go wrong with a set of nuts. Wild Country Rocks, Black Diamond Stoppers or the cheaper rip-offs of their design (ABC, Smiley,etc.) makes no real difference. If you can get a good deal (used rack) of hexes 4-11, then take it. Otherwise just start picking up cams one at a time in the 1" to 3" range. Once you get a full set of cams and develop the skill to place them you will not use the hexes very often, but by becoming proficent with hexes and stoppers you will develop a more intimate awareness of the stone's features which will improve your movement over stone as well as your ability to protect yourself and your partner. Leavenworth has a lot of easier crack routes that serve well. For a first outing, I would reccommend Mtneers dome unless most of it is so easy for you that it bores you to tears, or you get trompled by mounties. Progress toward multi-pitch classics like R&D Route, Sabre, Midway.

How do I say this tactfully: You are an idiot, and you are dead fuking wrong. As opposed to cams which take less practice? You are not an Alpine Fox. Maybe an Alpine Lemming.

I doubt that it is $60 for michael and his truck.

Is that like "jack-off arm"?

You said it all but seem to have missed the point.