JayB

Anyone ever climb out there? Any knowledge/information about how often stuff forms up out there? Seems like there'd be a ton of seeps out there, maybe even on some North facing aspects, but I've never heard anything about it. Seems like if stuff forms up at Vantage once in a while...

Sounds like most of the Platte got torched this summer, and Turkey Rocks and some other areas are closed as a result. Anything still open for climbing out there?

quote: Originally posted by Retrosaurus:

quote: Originally posted by erik:

Thanks for the thoughtful input Matt. I'll try to look up the specifics for the bolt in question and/or contact the manufacturer, determine the actual depth of the placement as carefully as I can, then make the call. It may in fact be best just to leave the bolt in place and cut off the stud above the nut. I'll post an update when it's either trimmed or replaced. As far as damage to the rock is concerned, every bolt will be different I imagine, but I'd be interested in hearing from some of the folks on this board who have experience removing brand-new 3/8" bolts from granite. How did the rock fare? Would a tie-rod separator be sufficient or would it be necessary to use burlier hardware to get the bolt out?

The plan is to remove the bolt if possible (this one is a 3/8" expansion bolt* and replace it with a 10mm expansion bolt, 12mm if necessary. If it's not possible to remove it but I can pull the shaft out a bit, the next step would be to cut it off as close to the surface of the hole as possible, pound the rest back into the hole, then patch the surface with a mixture of epoxy resin and granite dust, then install a new bolt a few inches away from the original placement. Any feedback is welcome though. *I switched out the drill bit from 10mm to 3/8" prior to starting this hole if anyone is wondering. [ 11-04-2002, 01:40 PM: Message edited by: JayB ]

ScottP: I wondered about that one myself, but felt obligated to disclose the information about the bolt anyway. There are also a couple of other factors that should keep any such scenario from coming to pass/keep me from worrying too much. While no route "requires" that a leader place gear, this particular bolt is far enough above the ledge 30-40' that most prudent leaders will place gear before arriving at this bolt. There's a crack that will accept cams in the green-alien range 15 feet or so below this bolt. There's also the fact that in all likelihood anyone attempting this route will have to climb 3-4 pitches of Online first, so the odds that a rank beginner/someone without the right gear to protect the initial portions of the route/liable look at a bolt with roughly 1" of stud protruding above the surface and not at least ponder the possibility that the depth of the bolt placement is not optimal are thankfully pretty low.

I made a reference to the hangers that we replaced above, presence of which strongly influence my decision to pull an replace the final bolt. They were all Leeper hangers, subject ( I presume) to the warning listed below. From the American Safe Climbing Association: Leeper reiterates recalled hanger warning Ed Leeper, manufacturer of the standard hanger of the 1960s-70s, is once again reiterating the warning of the danger present in his recalled hangers. 95,000 of them were sold, and at this time, one in a hundred is prone to sudden catastrophic failure - even if has never once been weighted or hung from! Copy hangers that were homemade are even more likely to suddenly break, even with only body weight, let alone a fall.

GregW, Scott Henderson and I replaced the rusty 1/4" bolts on American Pie and Black Fly with modern stainless hardware yesterday (stainless 25kN hangers and 10mm bolts, 12mm for the anchors). We enlarged the existing holes to place the new stuff. There are no additional bolts on either of the routes. Additional information concerning the first bolt on Black Fly: I had to make a judgement call when replacing the final bolt of the day (the first bolt on Black Fly). I knew I was running out of battery power prior to removing this bolt, but given the condition of the original bolts that we had removed elsewhere, I concluded that a modern stainless 3/8" expansion bolt would be safer than a rusty 20 year old 1'4" buttonhead, even if the hole it was seated in was no deeper (the original 1/4" bolts are approximately 1 1/4" long). I was able to bore the hole approximately 1 3/4" deep before the battery gave out. I estimate that in a hole of this depth the expansion cone which supplies most of the protection against the bolt pulling out of the hole is seated approximately 1 1/2 inches from the surface of the rock. This is not the optimal depth for the bolt, but I have much more confidence in its shear/pull out-strength and in the integrity of its hanger than the bolt I removed. Even though it is safer than what I found, it's not the way I want to leave things, so I am planning to return to the area as soon as possible (within the month)to pull the bolt and put another in its place. I wouldn't hesistate to trust my life to this bolt, but I decided to post this information in a public forum so that anyone who might want to climb the route can make an informed decision before doing the same.* [ 11-04-2002, 10:56 AM: Message edited by: JayB ]

I set an TR anchor for some friends very much like JK describes. Once. It was my second or third lead outside, and on my two previous leads I'd the anchors included chains that I simply threaded the ropes through if my friends wished to TR the climbs (wasn't thinking about wear and tear on the chains at that point either). I topped out on this particular climb and found that their were no chains. No problem, I'll just clip a locker to each hanger, loop a couple of runners between each hanger, then clip three biners to the runners with the gates opposed over the top of the runners, lower off, and all will be well. Both of my friends TR'd the route, then I headed up the route again to retrieve my gear and rap down. When I looked at the TR set-up I had installed again I immediately recognized my mistake and felt sick. I knew that in the unlikely event that one of the bolts serving as the anchor blew, all of the biners, the rope, and one of my friends would have gone careening to the ground. My negligence could have very well killed, paralyzed, or maimed one of my friends. I felt so ashamed that once I rapped down I immediately explained what I had done wrong to my friends, apologized, and said I hoped that they could forgive me, but I'd understand if they couldn't. They put their faith in me and I blew it. Thanfully luck was on my side, but even after several years I think about what might have happened if it hadn't been. My friends trusted me with their lives and I blew it, big time. I vowed that I would never let that happen again, and if it did I would quit climbing altogether. I try to remember that lesson often, and keep it in mind every time I set an anchor that someone else's life depends on. I got lucky once, but I have done everything in my power - including obsessing over anchor set-ups, setting up c-z systems in the yard, etc - to insure that luck never, ever plays a role in determining whether or not someone lives or dies as a result of an anchor I've set. [ 11-02-2002, 06:09 PM: Message edited by: JayB ]

No idea whatsoever why this guy should be of interest and/or what manner of free association ever led to his appearance on this site, but here's his bio: An English dramatist, Tom Stoppard, b. Zlin, Czechoslovakia, July 3, 1937, moved to England with his parents as a young boy and there began a career as a reporter and free-lance journalist. His theatrical career began with the writing of radio and television plays, but his first international success came with the prizewinning Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1966), a retelling of Hamlet through the eyes of two marginal characters. Stoppard's inventiveness has continued through a long series of plays--including The Real Inspector Hound (1968), Travesties (1974), Night and Day (1979), The Real Thing (1982), and In the Native State (1991)--as well as a novel (Lord Malquist and Mr. Moon, 1966), radio and television plays, and screenplays for a number of movies. Bibliography: Andretta, R. A., The Plays of Tom Stoppard (1991); Jenkins, A., The Theatre of Tom Stoppard (1987) and, as ed., Critical Essays on Tom Stoppard (1990); Stammels, Neil, Tom Stoppard (1988).

quote: Originally posted by mattp:

quote: Originally posted by mattp:

There's always Ouray. There was a 150' or so WI2 flow with about 60' of steeper ice capped by a short vertical step about 15 minutes from my house in Colorado Springs. Used to hit that before work about once a week. Mount The flows at Mt. Lincoln are already in and they'll be there until June.....sigh.... There's got to be more ice out here than the stuff at Banks Lake and the one or two %#$ing flows at Alpental - but no one's talking. Hopefully this situation will improve when the guidebook comes out or invents a teleporter to Lilloet. [ 11-01-2002, 11:05 AM: Message edited by: JayB ]

Seems like that's sort of endemic to climbing discussions in general. No one wants to come off like a melodramatic wanker, but even when taking that into account, I'm still amazed at how seldom anyone brings up fear, doubt, apprehension, misgivings, etc. when discussing climbing. Confronting those feelings and overcoming them, or at least coming to terms with them, seems to be at least as much a part of climbing as the rest of it. For most folks these are all part of the reality of climbing at some point, but they do seem to get glossed over most of the time.

quote: Originally posted by Retrosaurus:

Seriously though ---- with as cold as it's been, has anyone seen anything forming up? Jason?Alex? Anyone?

quote: Originally posted by eric8: There is a guide to climbing at the UW rock. can i buy it somewhere. Is it published online? (maybe i'll donate money to that site) I picked up a guide at the UW bookstore in 96 or 97 when I was going to school there, but I don't think that it's part of the regular selection there. Jeff Smoot has a book on his site called "Pumping Concrete: A Guide to Seattle Area Climbing Walls" or something like that on his site (wwww.climbingwashington.com)for $10 or so. I suspect it's got many of the same problems listed in the old guide.

Though I am part of the ever-swollen ranks of bumblers that finds enough challenge in WI3 to keep me happy just about all of the time, I didn't take offense with anything that Mitch had to say in his post. To me, it sounded like he was saying that the degree of difficulty, commmitment, and risk associated with steep-but-less-than-verticle ice and the dead verticAL stuff is such that the two can seem like completely different activities at times, and that doesn't seem so unreasonable to me. In fact, if one were to divide all pure ice climbing into two separate grades, drawing the line at the juction between verticle and less-than-verticAL wouldn't be a bad place to put that line IMO. It's a lesson that I had driven home in a big way during my first season of ice. My first day out I led a WI2 flow, and like most folks found it to be pretty easy going. After topping out on this test-piece I wisely concluded that I aquired enough experience to make an informed judgement about all of ice climbing, and that on the whole it must be a whole lot easier than people made it out to be. I shared my wisdom with a fellow who had been climbing ice since the mid-70's, who just laughed and suggested that I might find the going a bit more difficult when the ice got steeper. I headed out to a two-pitch WI3/4 flow outside of town a couple of days later and, properly emboldened by my mastery of the WI2 stuff, set out to lead both pitches. What followed ranks right up there with a botched early trad-lead as one of the more terrifying experiences of my life. I can remember feeling pretty cocky at the start of the first pitch, and fighting off the urge to weep and vomit simultaneously by the time I was topping out on the final few feet of the climb. I let myself get suckered in by the fat, sticky ice on the lower angled terrain below, and found myself on hard, fracture prone, and pretty-damned-close-to-straight-up ice a few inches thick by the time I was close to topping out. My calves felt like they were being barbequed with a butane torch, my hands were about as useful as stumps inside my sopping-wet ski gloves, and the best placement I could find with my tool was a hooking placement with fracture lines radiating away from it in every conceivable direction. Getting a screw off of my harness and into the ice over the course of the next five minutes proved very interesting. The climb concluded with me shamelessly hooking a rap sling dangling down from the tree at the top of the route, impaling a big root with my other tool, then working my tools up the trunk until I could lurch/heave myself onto the ledge and clip into the nest of webbing tied around it. After lying there for a minute or two I opened my eyes, looked below and saw that the guy I'd amused with my thoughts concerning ice climbing a couple of days earlier was at the top of the first pitch. We waved and wondered aloud if I'd care to restate my any of my rather broad conclusions concerning ice-climbing. I've climbed a fair amount of ice since then but still approach anything that gets close to verticAL with a great deal of humility, caution, and respect. Though I feel like I've made some headway in terms of technique, when I get on anything that's straight up, the pump in my forearms and calves is always unrelenting, the fear is nearly constant, placing screws takes as much determination and focus as I can muster, and I remember that I'm just a whole lot happier on WI3-WI3+, which incidentally is where I spend about 80% of my time when I'm leading. Hopefully I'll reach a point where I feel as confident and secure on sustained verticAL stretches as I do on more moderate terrain, but even if that day comes I'll never lose the respect I learned for the steep stuff. For me at least, that's a whole different ball game. [ 10-31-2002, 05:09 PM: Message edited by: JayB ]

quote: Originally posted by chucK:

Dear God! Verticle! What kind of a jackass would misspell vertical a dozen times in a single post. Oh wait...must edit before someone quotes post....

Very good. I've instructed the folks at my bank to send along $1,000.00 to the address you've specified the moment the Arabs and Israelis settle their differences.

quote: Originally posted by chucK: Put your money where your mouth is JayB. Send him some cash. chucK: Due to the limitations of the medium, It's hard to tell what your tone was on that last one, but you seem like a good guy, even though we seem to be at odds over stuff quite a bit on this board. While my point on that last post wasn't to be a cheerleader for Scott's fundraising efforts, I can certainly understand where you are coming from if you were saying "Put up or shut up." I try to do just that, and if the guys who ran this site asked for contributions I'd like to think that I'd be among the first to send a check their way, as I could hardly claim that I don't use this site much. I haven't gotten around to using Scott's site much, but if I do I'll certainly contribute. I do like to think that I do as good a job as the next guy when it comes to "putting my money where my mouth is" though. I've tried to pitch in with time or money whenever I could since moving back here, and will continue to do so as my supply of time and money permit. I helped out on a project to replace some bolts at and do some trail work at Static Point not too long ago, and sent 40 stainless hangers and a rap station to the fellow who was organizing the retrofix at Vantage this spring. I'm looking forward to making more contributions as my supply of time and money will allow. On an unrelated and gaper-worthy note, I finally did "Over the Rainbow" with no rocks for feet on the east-facing block just to the right of the main wall at UW last nigh after 3-months of effort. Woohoo! If only there was someone there with a digital camera.....

I'm not trying to scold anyone or take issue with anyone's post in particular here, but I think that in general abusing Scott has become sort of a bandwagon phenomenon on this site, and as such he's been hit with a lot more flack than he deserves. That's not to say he hasn't had a regrattable post or two, but that certainly is true of just about everyone who posts here often enough, so I'm not sure why he's been singled out the way he has. I've actually been pretty impressed by the fact that he's been able to take it on the chin and keep posting, and add some self-effacing humor along the way. I haven't checked out his site very often, and am not sure I'd go about raising funds for a such project in the same fashion, but I respect the time and effort he's taken to put it up and share it with everyone on the net. Moreover, I suspect that most of the climbing public have a skill level that's pretty close to Scott's (and my own), and would perceive the routes he's covered in much the same way that he presents them. If I were to jot down my honest recollections of the way I felt on certain portions Dreamer, Online, Outerspace and even some pretty mild sport routes I had the chance to climb I'm sure that the result would be pretty laughable to the folks who routinely cruise up routes like that on their mellow days. I'm certainly inspired when I read about 2 hours ascents of routes that it took me all day to get up, but I can also appreciate it when someone shares a perspective that's a bit closer to home. So Scott, if you're reading this - I've enjoyed the recent TR's and photos that you've added to the site and hope that you'll keep at it. [ 10-31-2002, 01:56 PM: Message edited by: JayB ]

I'd be interested in learning more about how other countries, including our neighbor to the north handle matters of personal and product liability. They seem to be getting along just fine without lawsuits that award the victims sums that are out of all proportion to the injury they've sustained, class action lawsuits that bankrupt entire industries, insurance premiums that help drive the price of health care and lift tickets( )into the stratosphere, etc, etc, etc. However, I think it's silly to lay responsiblity for the faults that exist in our legal system solely at the foot of the attorneys. Spurious lawsuits certainly require an attorney/law firm to wage them, but the most important ingredient in the current mess is the ethics of a public thats essentially turned our legal system into something roughly akin to a lottery system that no one wants to reform because - who knows! - maybe one day they'll be on the receiving end of a big settlement. Who cares whether it's warranted or not or what it's ultimate impact on society will be. Will it continue to contribute to the ever escalating costs of healthcare? Who cares - I've got my check. In the end, it seems that blaming attorneys for the blight of spurious lawsuits and the attendant costs that they inflict on society is a bit like blaming dealers for the drug problem. Take away the demand and they both go away. [ 10-29-2002, 01:57 PM: Message edited by: JayB ]