Montana_Climber

200's ?? Who still skis on 200's ?? People who like to ski fast Nothing wrong with long skis. I use 207's. Then when the race is done, I finish skiing down the hill, across the parking lot, and directly to my car. I go down to 190's for the steep and narrows in the back-country but when the powder is 10 feet deep and reminds you of champagne, you can ski anything through it. Ahhh, the joys of a Montana winter. Just don't mind the -40 temps.

These are used but only on about 6 days. They are still in excellent condition. I've decided that by now they aren't going to stretch at all so I need to buy a larger size. They are killing my feet, to the point where it's beyond painful and I can't complete one pitch. I normally wear a size 12 (46) street shoe. PM me for a pic or more information. $60 shipped.

I have a Nikon N65 with Quantaray 28-90mm lens also. I only want $200 and then actual shipping price. The body has never been used and the lens has only been used for 1 roll. I bought a set of body and 2 Nikkor lenses for a lot more but I got the 28-80 and 70-300 all together. PM me for sample pictures from the one roll. Most were taken in Yosemite.

There is a company in Colorado called Opticus. They used to advertise in all the climbing magazines and they have a website. Opticus They aren't cheap either but they'll give you exactly what you want, including prescription lenses. They sell Cebe and Julbo. I used to have Julbos but the frames stress too easily and the lens end up falling out. They lasted me one expedition to Denali and a summer's worth of glacial travel in the lower 48. I had to constantly rescrew the lenses in place. I would definitely go with side shields in any glacial situation at higher altitudes. It's hard as hell to ice climb in those buggers though. For many things now, I use a pair of Smith Bazookas with polarized lenses. They don't cut out the IR but they do a good enough job on the sun and UV for me to keep me happy. They also work much better for ice climbing when I don't feel like using goggles (i.e. an approach on a very sunny day). If I'm going above 15,000' I use the better shades.

Have you tried to find a Cloudveil Schoeller jacket on sale? The Serendipity is the one I have and love it as long as it's not raining. Ice climbing and skiing are no problem in it. I bought it a few years ago for %40 off at an outdoor stores summer sale. I wouldn't buy it at normal price though. It is a bit pricey. $$$

Get what's comfortable, what will keep you warm, what's light, and what doesn't cost an arm and a leg. Instead of arguing over the point....get out and climb.

Especially if it hits you in the eye. But that's only if the hairy palms don't catch it first.

Almost as bad as my friend's boot getting blown off the top of Half Dome and having to walk 8.5 miles back to the car barefoot.

Or the "crack" of a serac falling while navigating through an icefall.

Here is the best I could do on a drill setup. I emailed someone who used to bolt stuff with Alex in Hyalite. Following is the email response that I got: "He used a battery pack which was external to the drill, and was worn in a fanny pack. It was rigged with wires that ran up to the drill itself. The battery pack wa a standard voltage ( 18 V, I think ? ) that the drill uses, but the batteries were rigged in parallel, so they lassted longer. The wires weren't long enough to leave the battery on the ground- the resistance would have been too high - but only long enough to reach from fanny- pack to extended arm. *** The idea there was that it was easier to reach high and place a bolt high if the drill weighed less- a heavy drill ( onee with a bunch of batteries ) would be tiring to get as high. The second advantage was that you could get a ton of holes without recharging , even in the cold. I think we got around twenty, what with aid bolts + belay bolts + descent. I think he had a Bosch, but maybe a Hilti. In my limited drilling experience I would recommend one of those; skip the Ryobi, I have used one and I think it sucks. Less expensive alternative to one of the cordless power drills- yeah, pass this on!!: Pika makes an excellent hand drill - inexpensive, light, and the batteries never need recharging! Thanks for your updates to the Montana Ice website this winter- your contributions were accurate and concise, which is what makes the website really work for all of us! Jim Earl jimurl@montanaice.com http://www.montanaice.com Montana's Online Ice Climbing Guidebook "

Nah, it looks like he's just using an example. It would be interesting to find out if there are certain times of the year when the down is better quality. That would definitely influence my buying habits for my next down purchases.

I doubt it would be too hard to beat the $60-$112 for a camalot (shit, who can afford those #5s anyway), and still have comparable quality. That's what pro-deals and good friends are for....

I actually like those old BD double axle cams. I think they are easier for cleaning. If you take a piece of 1-1.5 mm accessory cord and run it through the finger pull to the cross piece at the end of the double axles (opposite the cams), you have a few extra inches to work with in the crack. Also, you only have one piece to pull with a cleaning tool as opposed to one on each side with a single axle design.

Won't the solvent in the duct tape glue weaken the slings?

hurricane hand driller will work. it takes a little practice to get a good hole. cost is about 100 bucks. Excellent choice for a hand drill. I think I was reading about a set up or maybe Alex Lowe was telling me about it but at any rate he used a Black and Decker 18 V portable, regular drill, for bolting Hyalite Canyon. He had a system where he made about a 50 ft cord to the batteries that his belayer had his hands on. The belay slave could then change the batteries for him at a rate of about 1 battery per every 2-3 bolts. He also modified the battery pack so that it wasn't your standard rechargeable battery. He upped the storage capacity so that he had a very powerful battery throughout most of the time he was drilling rather than a slow leak of power throughout the discharge. I'll see if I can dig up some more information about it.

I consider a Hotwire I have to be broken. Nothing snapped but the gate is now about 30 degress off of center. I took a 40' fall while aiding at Looking Glass in NC. The hook placement I was on blew, followed by an old fixed pin that snapped, followed by a TCU that had only 2 cams in contact (needed one of those hybrid Aliens). The bolt finally caught me but when I looked up at it, I noticed that the biner was cross-loaded and the gate was wide open. It wasn't the fall that scared me as much as seeing that thing open like that. Other than that, I've never seen a spine or gate snap when placed well. I don't consider carabiners placed on edges in horizontals into this count.

That would be called a +60 degree F (+16 C) gore-tex shell. However, I do have a TNF alpine climber's bag that weighs in at about 20 oz. It's rated to +35 F but with full alpine gear on I've stayed comfortable as low as I've needed to go.

This guy does good work. He made me a patrol jacket when I was at Big Sky.

I like my Wired Bliss cams for weight, width of heads, cost, etc. It's worth checking them out at Wired Bliss

So now to totally change the subject from this thread has gone.... I was wondering about the physiology of oxygen exchange at extremely high altitudes. Take Everest, for instance. The top has a partial pressure of 243 mmHg. Sea level is 760 mmHg. At sea level only 20% of the atmosphere is oxygen and I'm assuming that the percentages remain the same. This would mean that at the top of Everest, the partial pressure of O2 would be about 45 mmHg, nearly the exact same as the pO2 of venous blood in the body. Normally, the oxygen exchange across the alveoli is driven by a very large gradient (at sea level this gradient is about 150 - 23 mmHg for warming/humidifying air which still roughly corresponds to a gradient of about 75 mmHg difference) but at such high altitudes this would not happen according to the above theoretical values. The humidity on the summit is usually somewhere between 40 and 60% (due to being in the jet stream) so perhaps the warming/humidifying effects are not as pronounced. This of course would be assuming that there is no supplemental oxygen. Perhaps for these above reasons, there are so few people who can actually make it to the top without oxygen. Carrying your own would artificially increase the partial pressures, etc, etc.

You are correct in saying that the body is controlled by CO2. There are receptors in the medulla that react to CO2 levels. They also react to O2 and H+ levels but no where near the same as they react to CO2. At first, with decreased oxygen available, the body's stores of CO2 increase until the blood is acidic (respiratory acidosis). In turn, the brain stimulates breathing so that you blow off a great deal of CO2. This is a compensatory mechanism. Diamox is a carbonic anhydrase inhibitor (blocks the formation of carbonic acid) and is a bicarbonate sink. This helps bring down the increased concentration of HCO3- that has developed due to ridding the body of all the CO2. This balancing of the CO2 and HCO3- allows the body to reduce the stresses it is placed under. This is one possible mechanism of the benefits of this drug.

Not necessarily true. Just because you start it doens't mean that you must continue to take it. It doesn't actually relieve any symptoms per se like an aspirin would do for a headache. The best medicines on the mountain are proper hydration, proper sustenance, and proper rest. When one of these is lacking, an alternative like Diamox may be able to help restore it. In a case like lack of rest, one may feel terrible by the day's end. If Diamox is taken that night and the climber can get a good night's sleep, they should be able to recover as long as there isn't a more serious problem like HAPE. If the next day is easy and the climber continues to get good sleep, Diamox is no longer needed, even if continuing much higher up a mountain.

It is a sulfa moiety but it is one that most people can tolerate even when they are allergic to true sulfa drugs like a TMP/SXT combination. If you were interested in finding out if you were allergic, you could take about a quarter of a 125 mg pill. If you felt flushed, had any hives develop, or felt a constriction of your throat, then it wouldn't be advised to try it again. This is also something you would want to do at your home and not test it on the mountain. Diamox (acetozolamide) is a diuretic. How it actually helps you with altitude sickness is not completely known. [i haven't read the link yet so I don't know how much of this is repeat] It is believed to have its greatest effects by allowing a climber to sleep better. This allows for the body to adjust to the conditions more easily and utilize the oxygen present more efficiently. Therefore, it should be taken at nighttime, before going to bed. Since it is a diuretic, the last water consumed should be done at least one hour before bedtime and a last trip to the pee hole is usually necessary to keep you from making several more trips throughout the night.

You could always try some winter mountaineering in Wyoming/Montana/Idaho/Utah (Uintas). It consistently gets down to -30 to -40 F in certain parts. What were you trying in Nepal?

The people I've received information from are testers that do report to magazines like Backpacker, Climbing, and Rock & Ice as well as people in R&D at The North Face. Even they admit that their down bags can't stack up to some of the competition (however, they contend that their synthetics are the best). I was not implying that construction or quality is lacking in the other manufacturers. I am not sure if anyone else uses 36 SPI like Marmot. Feathered Friends, on the otherhand, cannot be beat for custom fitting and changing their templates. They all use the same quality down at 800+ and beyond. FF wins out for the features and customer service, not the workmanship as they are all damn fine bags. I personally went with the Marmot due to cost but I spent countless hours deciding between Marmot, FF, and WM.