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hopperhopper
Dec 3, 2007, 1:50 AM
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i've placed about 2 cams in my whole life so i am trad/aid incompetent.
i have a question about how people anchor in portaledges and hanging belays. when you're on a big wall and it's time to call it a day, how do you go about anchoring in your portaledge for the night? more specifically, how many anchor points do people use? is there a specific number that has been deemed safe? i've just always wondered how many pieces of pro people have to place to feel confident trusting it for 12 hours. do you need to have different types of pro (i.e. not all of them should be cams)? can you even use cams for that? same questions for hanging belays between pitches.
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ja1484
Dec 3, 2007, 2:00 AM
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Well traveled big wall trade routes tend to have bolted bivies, consisting of many bolts (5+) that allow for securing all your shite.
In other circumstances, there may be welcoming ledges/features.
As usual, "it depends".
Regarding hanging belays, they tend to be like all other belays - you build them until they're bomber, if that's possible.
(This post was edited by ja1484 on Dec 3, 2007, 2:03 AM)
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summerprophet
Dec 3, 2007, 3:22 AM
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Typical anchors (for all climbing situations) are a minimum of two good bolts, three pitons, or three pieces of trad gear. Trad gear may consist of nuts, cams, tricams, hexes, sliding nuts, or even slung horns or chockstones.
Aid climbers typically build two anchors at each station, one to haul off of and one to anchor yourself (and your partner, via the lead line).
When it is time to call it a night, you set up a ledge on the leadline anchor. with the haul bag nearby (as that is where all the goodies are).
As mentioned allready, super popular routes (referred to as trade routes) usually have bolted anchors. These are typically three bolt anchors with the center bolt shared between the leadline anchor and hauling anchor.
Hope this helps.
J.
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gobennyjo
Dec 3, 2007, 4:08 AM
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Do people sleep with a harness on in the portaledge with a rope going to the anchor? Or is it not that likely to fall out?
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lambone
Dec 3, 2007, 6:08 AM
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I've hung my ledge off single copperheads and timebomb rusted out 1/4 inch bolts...
Sometimes you use what you have to get the ledge to fit right, especially if there are two ledges.
But I allways stay tied into the main powerpoint.
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tomtom
Dec 3, 2007, 6:21 PM
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gobennyjo wrote: Do people sleep with a harness on in the portaledge with a rope going to the anchor? Or is it not that likely to fall out?
Most climbers sleep tied in.
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moof
Dec 3, 2007, 11:35 PM
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gobennyjo wrote: Do people sleep with a harness on in the portaledge with a rope going to the anchor? Or is it not that likely to fall out?
I usually remove my leg loops and sleep in just the swami portion. If Im in a ledge I go with the lead rope. If it's a plush natural ledge I string a rope along (good for clipping all sorts of crap into), and sleep clipped in with my daisies only. That way I am tied in pretty short, but still can move along the ledge pretty easily.
One thing that becomes clear on walls after the first day is that "bomber" changes it's meaning. It's not uncommon to get to an anchor and just clip into the cluster. Sleeping in just your swami and daisies is the same sort of thing.
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brutusofwyde
Dec 4, 2007, 1:47 AM
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moof wrote: One thing that becomes clear on walls after the first day is that "bomber" changes it's meaning. It's not uncommon to get to an anchor and just clip into the cluster. Sleeping in just your swami and daisies is the same sort of thing.
Hmmm.
My partners and I stay pretty clear about where we are clipped in. "just clipping into the cluster" can have some pretty grim consequences, based on what I've seen happen to non-life-safety gear clip-ins in "the cluster"
but then, I'm pretty obsessive/compulsive. For example, I also keep my swami on, but tie into a sueprtape that is sewn through the wall of my sleeping bag. That, in turn, is tied into the inner tie-in of my bivy sack. The outer connection of the bivy sack is, finally, tied to the rope or daisys.
That way I don't have rain wicking in along my rope when it dumps. Also sleep warmer and more comfy.
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stymingersfink
Dec 17, 2007, 2:54 AM
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brutusofwyde wrote: but then, I'm pretty obsessive/compulsive.
brings to mind the saying about
"There are old climbers and bold climbers, but no old, bold climbers."
For the most part, bold is just calculated stupidity... an intentional mis-perception of the true risk:reward ratio. Ya go through enough situations, maybe later hear about friends dying in similar circumstances... kinda keeps ya a little more true to the safety aspect of things.
When it comes down to gettin busy livin, or gettin busy dyin... I like to climb. I'd like to do a fagrundle more of it.
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euroford
Dec 17, 2007, 3:02 PM
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sometimes the anchors can suck pretty seriously. but all of those obsessive/compulsive tendencies can make it reasonable. if your climbing where ASCA monkeys hang out, chances are you'll have plenty of fat new bolts making the whole anchor excersize pretty simple. if instead, your up on a route that gets climbing, like, never, than its a different story.
this is one of my personal favorites.
up on the left we got an ancient rusty knifeblade and a 1/4" drive in with a homemade hanger equalized with a sliding x. in the middle we have another semi ancient but larger bolt missing its hanger. to the right, some fella (bless his soul) left us the gift of one modern stainless fatty bolt.
the middle and right bolts got equalized with a sliding x and we hauled off of that, when the bags arrived we were happy to just anchor them straight to the new fatty bolt.
the sliding x mank on the left, the middle semi mank bolt and the fatty bolt then got threaded up with a cordolette which was used as the main anchor and also where the portaledge was anchored.
i wasn't bothered by this anchor one bit, it was actually one of the better ones on the route, which could really use some love. we got stuck down by weather at this spot and waited out a totally bitchin thunderstorm that raged for hours.
the only really problem here, is that its not spread out horizontally, so the pigs were under the portaledge. which in a way is good, because it helps keep them dry. but bad, because we couldn't get to our bourbon during the storm. total fukin gumby mistake that i'll never make again.
when the weather is closing in, MAKE SURE you have the booze with you in the ledge!!!
for anchoring in the portalegde, since we used an Anker cliff cabana which is equipped with a fully load bearing bearpaw at the main suspension point, i added a couple of short 8' dynamic 10mm ropes figure 8ed permanently into the ledge. this way we could get out of the lead rope and tie directly into the ledge.
this eliminates the problem of having ropes running to-from the anchor while your cowering underneath the ledge stormfly and helped reduce our clusterfrig with the leadrope. its nice to have it all neatly stored away in your Fish ropebag in the morning.
short ropes are available dirt cheap from gearexpress.com so you can cut and hack them into usefull items like this.
i just wear my yates bigwall harness, and don't bother taking the legloops off or anything. sleeping comfort is not really an issue, in fact, staying up to enjoy the stars is an issue, i just can't keep my eyes open worth a damn when the days action is finally done.
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dingus
Dec 17, 2007, 3:13 PM
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stymingersfink wrote: brutusofwyde wrote: but then, I'm pretty obsessive/compulsive. Sometimes that's all that keeps us alive. brings to mind the saying about "There are old climbers and bold climbers, but no old, bold climbers."
No, there are and Brutus is one of them.
There are lots of them it turns out!
My friend Scuffy went to a rendevoux last summer at a SoCal bouldering sport. Now fewer than TWENTY oldsters showed up who fit the following criteria:
Older than 50
Still cranking => 5.12
All I could say was....
(I can STILL crank 5.6!)
DMT
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stymingersfink
Dec 18, 2007, 12:16 AM
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dingus wrote: stymingersfink wrote: brutusofwyde wrote: but then, I'm pretty obsessive/compulsive. Sometimes that's all that keeps us alive. brings to mind the saying about "There are old climbers and bold climbers, but no old, bold climbers." No, there are and Brutus is one of them. There are lots of them it turns out! My friend Scuffy went to a rendevoux last summer at a SoCal bouldering sport. Now fewer than TWENTY oldsters showed up who fit the following criteria: Older than 50 Still cranking => 5.12 All I could say was.... (I can STILL crank 5.6!) DMT
I was talking about old, bold climbers.
for instance: Fred on ice can follow pretty much any ice you can ropegun, but does he lead even WI3 still?
No...
He's smart enough to leave that kind of bold to the younger ropegun types (not that WI3 is really all that bold).
Even Brutus probably foregos the lead on trad 5.12's with a 50' runout ledge-strike potential.
...not that I blame him one bit!
[aside]
Dingus, you ever get out Salt Lake way when the ice is in, whaddaya say I show you around a bit, maybe hit some of my favorites?
[/aside]
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brutusofwyde
Dec 21, 2007, 8:35 PM
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I was never able to onsight even 5.11 solidly, even in the days of my youth.
These days "Sierra 4th class" is about my limit.
Old, but was never hard or bold.
Brutus the feeble (W)anchor
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stymingersfink
Dec 22, 2007, 2:31 AM
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brutusofwyde wrote: Old, but was never hard or bold. Brutus the LIAR
Fixed that for you.
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philbox
Moderator
Dec 27, 2007, 11:25 PM
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Leonard Coyne is one of those old bold climbers that is still cranking hard these days. He keeps threatening to take me to the Black Canyon ofThe Gunnison.
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jgloporto
Jan 11, 2008, 4:49 PM
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hopperhopper wrote: i've placed about 2 cams in my whole life so i am trad/aid incompetent. i have a question about how people anchor in portaledges and hanging belays. when you're on a big wall and it's time to call it a day, how do you go about anchoring in your portaledge for the night? more specifically, how many anchor points do people use? is there a specific number that has been deemed safe? i've just always wondered how many pieces of pro people have to place to feel confident trusting it for 12 hours. do you need to have different types of pro (i.e. not all of them should be cams)? can you even use cams for that? same questions for hanging belays between pitches.
Cams will only explode on you during bivies/hanging belays...
It's your funeral.
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