expanding flake on green drag-on?

[Guest]

i've done green drag-on with a partner last october. he led the second and fourth pitches and i led the first third and fifth and i don't remember him mentioning an expanding flake on the fourth pitch, but i saw a topo a couple weeks ago that said there was one. i'm doing it this weekend and i've never done an expanding flake before. how do i do it with out getting my cams stuck in the crack?

[Sol]

there is no true expando on gd. at the beginning of the second pitch there is a two move flake that gets you to the bolt ladder, it expands a bit, but you don't leave any gear in it, its chill. later on in the pitch whilst cruxing out in the seam you have the option to plug gear into the thin flake out to the right, though it is thin and purported to be loose, it does not expand. there is definetly no expando on the 4th pitch. its steep, easy, and essentially c1 the whole way.

[Guest]

o.k. well that explains why my buddy never mentioned anything. it wasn't the sky vally rock topo that i saw, it was a hand drawn topo and i don't know where he got it from.

 

so for future reference when i go down to the valley it's likely i will run across an expando flake of two. so how do i deal with them when i come across them?

 

dave

[dberdinka]

I'm certainly no expert but I've done a few that had me crapping in my pants so....

 

Use pins. They take the expansion out of the flake, try starting with a pin.

 

Use as much clean gear as possible. If you place two pins in a row, placing the second will loosen the first until it pops. If you must place two pins in the row, set the second then clip into it tight with a daisy. Keep pounding. When the first pops the second should hold your weight. Scary! but it works.

 

Use hooks. Sky hooks obviously avoid the flake. Cam hooks fit nice in pin scars and won't pop (at least not as easily)when placing pins above.

 

There is lots of Expando flakes in Squish. The only expando flakes I've climbed at Index were on Golden Arch. Just a few moves but mixed in with sketchy hooking, fixed heads and such it certainly gets the blood flowing!

[Guest]

so it turns out the topo guess was out of sky vally rock. it says pretty clearly that the fourth pitch has something expanding on it. c2+ expanding. so i'm confused.

 

http://www.stanford.edu/~clint/index/

[dberdinka]

You're looking at topos for aid climbs put together by free climbers. Of course it's screwed!!!

 

GD is not particularly difficult or scary. All the pitches are essentially C2ish at one point or another. Grab two sets of cams, some offset nuts, a hook and a cam hook and just do it!

[DCramer]

I would review your source again...

[tomtom]

http://www.stanford.edu/~clint/index/

 

A couple minor edits to this topo ...

 

The first pitch of GD (aid) is a thin crack to the right of the first pitch of Davis Holland almost directly under Town Crier.

 

Pitches 2 & 3 can be linked with a 60m, so the lengths are shorter than listed. Has anyone linked 4&5? I think it's doable.

 

A couple hook moves will get you between the first two bolts on p4 (where it says expanding flake).

 

There's a hook placement between the last bolt and the anchor on p4. No free move required.

 

The hangars are in place on p5.

 

p6 is a little more than 4th when it's wet.

[IceIceBaby]

Great route would love to do it again

[Guest]

thanks for the info. i didn't think it looked right when he showed it to me, but he thought it was so i decided i would put myself on the line and find out. thanks again.