well, its harder to do than rap bolting and hence its a better style. and a bit more risky.

It's been discussed at length how a ground up FA is better style than cleaning and bolting something on rappel.

Here's my question. If you're going ground up, but using aid to drill holes and place bolts, is that really any better style than rap bolting?

Anyway, rap or ground up is mostly a question of STYLE. If the bolter knows what they are doing they should be able to put the bolts in the right place either way (although more difficult with ground up).

Ground up is a better style (more challenging usually), but that's up to the FA, and we are mostly talking sport here, where difficulty (and the best placement of the bolts) is the main concern, so style of the FA isn't a big deal. The only way you would know if it was rap bolted is if you ask the FA, so who cares? (besides the FA, who will choose their own style)

The only ethical consideration I can think of is whether a rap bolter has "taken" away a line someone else could have done it ground up. But that leads to elitism, which is the antithesis of the individuality of climbing. In some areas where that ethic is in place and the challenge to do ground up FAs is established (trad areas mainly) we should respect that, but in most areas we should defer to the age old guideline of humanity: first come, first served.

Ok, just for fun.

Here's my question. If you're going ground up, but using aid to drill holes and place bolts, is that really any better style than rap bolting? Neither is drilled from a natural stance. You're either hanging from a hook, a piece, or in the case of rap bolting, a rope.

so you are directly associating increased difficulty/effort with better style? and riskier doesn't necessarily equate with better style.

Double gastoning your way up a fist crack is way harder than jamming it but is definitely not better style!

fractuer, spoken like a true climber of small rocks :roll: yes once you have the hole partialy drilled it is common practice and allways has been to tell your brain that if your feet blow out or your hook pops that you will hang on to the drill to avoid the fall. i have never been successfull at this. everytime my hook has popped i have gone for the big ride regardless of how far allong the hole was. Why dont you give it a try before you diregard it as cheating :roll:

e sometimes have to do 3 or 4 bat hooks in a row. Sure its aid, but its still the unknown. Try hanging on a bat hook, wiggling around trying to work out the moves to see if the route goes or not, its a bit exciting.

only in sonora

adventure trad climbs

Ground Up v.s. Rap Bolting is a style NOT an ethics issue.

Style only relates to the person doing it, not the whole climbing community. For that reason, this issue is only relevant to the FA. It all depends how much adventure he wants to wring out of his project. As long as the job is done right it really doesn't matter for subsequent climbers.

look, its pretty simple really. the whole point of climbing something is starting at the bottom and finishing at the top.

Trophy for you. :wink:

That's a nice simplification, but in the case of both rap bolting and going ground up on aid, subsequent ascents will not be done in the same 'style' as the FA. Sounds like another contrived game to me. Oh wait, this is climbing we're talking about.

It's my personal interest in doing the climb. The climb, and doing it free, is what's important to me.

...doing a climb from the ground up, not really knowing what is going to happen next...

fractuer, spoken like a true climber of small rocks :roll: yes once you have the hole partialy drilled it is common practice and allways has been to tell your brain that if your feet blow out or your hook pops that you will hang on to the drill to avoid the fall. i have never been successfull at this. everytime my hook has popped i have gone for the big ride regardless of how far allong the hole was. Why dont you give it a try before you diregard it as cheating :roll:

Unless there are rocks barring you from accessing food, water, shelter, or sex, climbing them is contrived. However, hooking a natural features is not as contrived as swinging in on a rope from above.

On a lot of routes, even a good natural hook can be hard to come by, so climbing them using hooks to drill certain bolts is still using what the rock is providing in a much greater way than rap bolting near a hard move where the rock would not have permited a stance or a hook.

And I don't think of rap bolting of stealing lines at all. Who are these people that I am obligated to 'save' rock for? I for one am stoked when someone else has put up a route, so that I can get on it. Let them sweat, let them get their FA, and then let me do the climb. Sounds good to me!

Couldn't agree more. Putting up a route (on rap or otherwise) doesn't steal routes: it provides routes for people to climb.

Of course, if you do a s--- job of it and then don't want anyone to move bolts or otherwise fix it, it could count as "stealing lines"...

8^)

The only ethical consideration I can think of is whether a rap bolter has "taken" away a line someone else could have done it ground up. But that leads to elitism, which is the antithesis of the individuality of climbing.

Who are you quoting? Not me.

I think it's great you ground up your FA ethics.


What kind of grinder did you use?

So the question is: is that aid? Is that common practice when drilling "ground up and free"? Because it sure as hell doesn't sound free to me....

(But what do I know; from my perspective, that whole style of game is basically a joke ).

I use a coffee grinder. set on "course grind" [sic] for offwidths

"It's just about the climbing" is the excuse all the wimpy whiners use when they top rope a climb rather than lead it. the same excuse is used for rap bolting. the real reason is lack of sack

Not saying you can't be a badass 20 feet off the ground, but at places where you can walk to the top in 2 minutes the debate about whether stuff was drilled on lead is kind of silly and artificial.

If you're going ground up, but using aid to drill holes and place bolts, is that really any better style than rap bolting? Neither is drilled from a natural stance. You're either hanging from a hook, a piece, or in the case of rap bolting, a rope.

Yos granite is one thing, but at some 50' east coast sport cliff the important thing is that the bolt _placements_ be determined "ground-up." The person putting up the route needs to have made enough laps to know where the logical stances are, rather than just rapping some mess they can't do and bolting it into submission. If the locations of the bolts are sound, I don't care if you drove a firetruck up to the base and drilled from the mechanical ladder. I'm not trying to be a snob, but most of the bolting going on these days isn't proud yosemite (or stone mountain, or whatever classic area you want to talk about) FA's, but just people creating nice little local sport crags. Not saying you can't be a badass 20 feet off the ground, but at places where you can walk to the top in 2 minutes the debate about whether stuff was drilled on lead is kind of silly and artificial.

Bobd. you really can't convince me that hanging on an old semi retired 11mm rope is as much fun as a scetch bird beak I will admit though that my tired tendons have been yearning to get ahold of one of them new fangled 24volt annhiloators

It's only my opinion, but what's silly and artificial is gridbolting cliffs that are 50' at the tallest point, with easy walks to the top. If you feel like drilling, drill toprope anchors, and leave it at that.

GO

True in theory, but lots of harder sport climbs are overhung such that TR can be dangerous, whether because of ground fall or swingers into other parts of the cliff or trees, not to mention that the idea of working a route at or past your limit on TR is sort of shot when every fall means a lower off because you can't swing back in.

True in theory, but lots of harder sport climbs are overhung such that TR can be dangerous, whether because of ground fall or swingers into other parts of the cliff or trees, not to mention that the idea of working a route at or past your limit on TR is sort of shot when every fall means a lower off because you can't swing back in.

Also, while some places do have mega-short hikes to the top, there are plenty of places where getting to the top is possible but a pain, and the ability to just lead and go (or lead easy adjacent routes to set TR) is what makes the place a great climbing area [cough]Rumney[cough]

Yep, we did roofs back home on TR some where the rope didn't start to engage until the crux and wasn't fully engage until after it, we all took some pretty stiff lower body pounds at least once on that climb. A couple of years after we left, someone broke his back on another one we had put up while coming back through the trees after having made it out through them at first. We were all well aware you were "runout" lower on the route when we were putting it up. The very best part of TR'ing roofs and hangs is no previewing, no cleaning, and most of all no dogging - figure it out or fly trying. Way, way more committing and demanding than simply slapping a bunch of bolts in and dogging (not working) your way up it...

Danger does not equal style

I also find it funny that so many people who have never put the time or effort into a first ascent have an opinion on how it should be done.

I avoided replying to the thread completely, due to my lack of experience with the subject matter, until I ran accross the post that seemed to be suggesting turning every TR cliff into a sport cliff. This seemed stupid to me, so I said so.