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Placing and pasting copperheads

Original Post
DrewSmith · · Tahoe City, CA · Joined Feb 2015 · Points: 116

Howdy folks,

Looking to get on my first Leaning Tower route, and I've invested in some heads and a hammer. I've got a few books and articles gathered that vaguely instruct good head placements, but I'm wondering if there is any other resource out there that may help before going outside and beating up $30 worth of heads. Particularly a video or graphic - I'm a visual learner.

Any tips, much appreciated.

Also - I'm aware that I probably won't be using the hammer on LT, but it's best to come prepared.

csproul · · Pittsboro...sort of, NC · Joined Dec 2009 · Points: 330

I just did most of WFLT. There is no place I saw where a head would necessary. Every place there was a fixed or blown head, there was an alternative placement. A tomahawk was definitely (more than) nice for a spot. Good luck, I'll be back on it soon to finish it.

DrewSmith · · Tahoe City, CA · Joined Feb 2015 · Points: 116

Wicked, thanks Russ. Looks like I'll be ordering that headmaster kit from you this week.

Kevin DeWeese · · Oakland, CA · Joined May 2014 · Points: 1

You will not need heads on West Face of Leaning Tower, period. There's no need to even bring a hammer as there is nowhere on the route where you would need it for any reason other than laziness or lack of clean climbing experience.leave the hammer at home and have fun up there!

csproul · · Pittsboro...sort of, NC · Joined Dec 2009 · Points: 330
Kevin DeWeese 1 wrote:You will not need heads on West Face of Leaning Tower, period. There's no need to even bring a hammer as there is nowhere on the route where you would need it for any reason other than laziness or lack of clean climbing experience.leave the hammer at home and have fun up there!
Just out of curiosity, have you done the route recently? Do you remember the start of the 4rd pitch (by the Supertopo, or midway through the 3rd pitch of the Bigwalls Guide...the last anchor before the Ahwahnee)? Right off the anchors was a fixed large Tomahawk. The next placement kind of stumped me. I couldn't get anything to stick in the flaring pod. I tried hand placed tomahawks and offset cams/nuts, and camhooks. Couldn't get them to stick. So I put the Tomahawk back in and and I...ahem...tapped it pretty hard with a carabiner. Not exactly hammering, but I still felt a little dirty about it. If you've done it recently, do you remember anything about that placement?
DrewSmith · · Tahoe City, CA · Joined Feb 2015 · Points: 116

Good to know. Out of curiosity, anyone here done the West Face in a day? I'm not keen on making it an all-weekend affair...confident on the climbing, just a bit nervous about crowds.

csproul · · Pittsboro...sort of, NC · Joined Dec 2009 · Points: 330

Gets done in a day all the time. A party did it in a short day while we were up there last weekend.We let them go at the start and they were done while we were hanging out on the Ahwahnee later that evening. Definitely faster than I'm capable of right now, but it seems reasonable to do it in a day if you are comfortable with the climbing.

Karsten Duncan · · Sacramento, CA · Joined Jan 2006 · Points: 2,571

Yeah Drew, it goes pretty easily in a day if you are reasonably fast. I soloed it in a day several years ago so a competent 2 person team should have no problem.

You can link 1-2 3-4 5-6 7-8 and 10-11 I think but if you were really going for speed you would short fix and have your partner jugging.

Kevin DeWeese · · @failfalling - Oakland, Ca · Joined Jan 2007 · Points: 981
csproul wrote: Just out of curiosity, have you done the route recently? Do you remember the start of the 4rd pitch (by the Supertopo, or midway through the 3rd pitch of the Bigwalls Guide...the last anchor before the Ahwahnee)? Right off the anchors was a fixed large Tomahawk. The next placement kind of stumped me. I couldn't get anything to stick in the flaring pod. I tried hand placed tomahawks and offset cams/nuts, and camhooks. Couldn't get them to stick. So I put the Tomahawk back in and and I...ahem...tapped it pretty hard with a carabiner. Not exactly hammering, but I still felt a little dirty about it. If you've done it recently, do you remember anything about that placement?
Last time I did the route was about 2 years ago, and then a few more times to ahwanee for WDD and for recons in the year before that, all while roped-soloing.

I know the section you're talking about and have taken a pretty long fall there when a blue/yellow metolious offset popped on me right as I was clipping my next piece (something small, offset, and jingus) I had to jug back up my lead line and place the same piece again too as nothing else I had seemed to work.

I can't be sure if the jingus offset placement is exactly where you're talking about or a placement or two above that. Either way, I got through it with whatever I had on me and don't recall enough (besides the fall) to qualify it in my memory as interesting enough to remember.

I said what I said in my original post because in all the times I've climbed Leaning Tower, I've never needed to clip a head where top stepping or hooking, or some other trickery wouldn't also have sufficed. and I'm only 5'7"

and a handplaced beak that's been hammered with a biner is A-OK in my books.
DrewSmith · · Tahoe City, CA · Joined Feb 2015 · Points: 116

Post climb update:

Done in a day, no problem. We climbed this past Sunday and didn't see another human all day. About 11 hours bottom-to-top. Took the hammer, but didn't even think about using it. Stoked!

Altered Ego · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jul 2008 · Points: 0

Why did you take the hammer? You don't need a hammer for that route.

Peter Zabrok · · Hamilton, ON · Joined Dec 2007 · Points: 645

Arguably the most comprehensive information on how to place heads appears right here in this very forum:

mountainproject.com/v/dr-pi…

[probably for the simple reason that very little has ever been written about how to place heads]

Perhaps a nice accompaniment to this post would be one about how to remove dead heads using a butterknife, which is a chisel that has been ground and modified.

Mark Hudon is the expert in head removal, so maybe he could write something. Maybe he already has....

Cheers,
Pete aka "Dr. Piton"

Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

Big Wall and Aid Climbing
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