Best place to buy bolts and hangers

eli poss wrote: Just looked at UIAA standard for mechanical bolts and the only strength specification is 20kN in tension. I was thinking there were minimums for both tension and shear loading, although I may be confusing EN standards with UIAA. Anybody know what, if any, EN standards are for bolts used in climbing? Is 25kN in tension and 20kN shear good?

The requirements for the UIAA Safety Label (it isn´t a standard) are 20kN axial loading and that the anchor conforms to EN959 which requires 25kN radial/15kN axial. The difference between the two requirements (15kN and 20kN) are in reality meaningless, just the UIAA like to be able to claim their safety label is "better" than the standard.

dnoB ekiM wrote:

What makes them better than a standard hanger?  

Seems the welding creates more complexity and chance for long term failure. 

Personally, I like the climbtech hangers.  Fixe are good too, but unnecessarily large.

The rod hangers have a number of advantages;-

They are far stronger.
They don´t damage karabiners.
The chance of nose hooking the karabiner is vastly reduced.
You can thread through and lower directly off the hanger.
For Alpine/multi pitch routes no extra quicklinks/rings are required for rapping.
Lower visual impact.
We make them also with a larger eye which for multi-pitch climbing makes it easier to clip multiple karabiners in.

Whether the welds are more prone to long-term corrosion is a debateable point especially in the context that they are being used with mechanical bolts which have their own long-term problems. Corrosion at the weld can be a problem with all welded products, chains, bolts, rings or whatever, we at least make considerable efforts to reduce the possibility of this happening by correct post treatment of the weld.

The downside is they are difficult and slow to make and inevitably cost more, they are the least profitable item I make and they really are only produced to use up offcuts and as a filler job. 

I like colored hangers that are inexpensive.

But rarely able to purchase the perfectly colored hanger needed, I touch them up anyway. I didn't mind the repeated process of prepping and painting bolt-heads and hangers, at first. Now it's getting tedious. What I do like about it is that as the rock on my route changes its appearance, my bolts follow in kind.

Huh, shouldn't there be a plethora of hanger/bolt-head hues to choose from, slightly similar to the lipstick aisle? And the hangers should all be inexpensive, right? Because the manufacturers have happily and significantly reduced the price on that particular item, not just to be eco-friendly to certain eyes -- they would also have helped the fiscally & time constrained FA climber to easier attain a lower level of the visual impact that we see on today's cliffs.

What are they doing, those pretty bolts out there, hinting when the sun's just right, glinting at us and guiding our eyes?

Many a time I have sighed a relief when a bolt easily came into sight, but why are manufacturers making uncolored ones, when to certain eyes they detract from the experience?

Matthias Holladay wrote: What are they doing, those pretty bolts out there, hinting when the sun's just right, glinting at us and guiding our eyes?

Many a time I have sighed a relief when a bolt easily came into sight, but why are manufacturers making uncolored ones, when to certain eyes they detract from the experience?

Are you talking about bolts or hangers? Nobody makes colored bolts because most of the body is in the rock and more importantly, they are made for the construction industry, where shiny stainless steel is not a bad thing.

Dylan Pike wrote:

Are you talking about bolts or hangers? Nobody makes colored bolts because most of the body is in the rock and more importantly, they are made for the construction industry, where shiny stainless steel is not a bad thing.

Another option would be to simply paint the cliff silver so they all blend in. I think I'll try it at Rumney's Waimea to see how it works out. It takes care of trying to match all the different rock shades also.

Any coating reduces the corrosion resistance of the hanger (Metolious have stated their colored hangers are only for dry desert climates) and more importantly conceals any corrosion that is occuring making inspection impossible.
The only two methods I know of that colour stainless steel in a satisfactory way are plasma coating and heat tinting both of which are expensive and it isn´t clear that the demand is there to justify setting up and running batches through (Fixe appear to have dropped their Mimitek range), a few people on the internet saying they want something isn´t the same as $10,000 up front!

Jim, you do good work both here spraying sage advice and with your product. Thanks.  Can you help me understand why "the powers that be" do not insist on a standard bolt head stamped symbol to the bolts length/depth?  More work for manufactures but also more info. for climbers.

Roy Suggett wrote: Jim, you do good work both here spraying sage advice and with your product. Thanks.  Can you help me understand why "the powers that be" do not insist on a standard bolt head stamped symbol to the bolts length/depth?  More work for manufactures but also more info. for climbers.

You mean generally or specific climbing bolts? Generally there´s no need, the length is on the box and if in doubt measuring is easy enough. Climbing specific the problem is as you can see in this thread that climbers buy commercially available bolts not ones only made for climbing (which are extremely rare anyway).

The powers that be (CENORM) have in fact proposed in the revised standard that rock anchors be marked indelibly and visible after installation with the makers name, material, model and batch number (length wasn´t on the list if I remember correctly). Exactly how we achieve this on a piece of stainless steel less than 7mm in diameter (the end of a 10mm wedge bolt) that is intended to be hit with a hammer is not clear and our objections to this have not been answered. CENORM actually though bolts and hangers were always sold as a set so we could mark the hanger showing a certain detatchment from reality!
What benefit there is in marking the length isn´t clear, either they are strong enough or they aren´t and the original installer knew the length anyway. If one fails you´ll know how long it was and to use longer ones (if that will solve the problem). The truth of the matter is virtually no-one actually knows how long the bolts need to be since they never measure it, they just guess and the minimum lengths in EN959 cover probably 95% of bolts installed quite adequately.

Jim Titt wrote:

You mean generally or specific climbing bolts? Generally there´s no need, the length is on the box and if in doubt measuring is easy enough. Climbing specific the problem is as you can see in this thread that climbers buy commercially available bolts not ones only made for climbing (which are extremely rare anyway).

The powers that be (CENORM) have in fact proposed in the revised standard that rock anchors be marked indelibly and visible after installation with the makers name, material, model and batch number (length wasn´t on the list if I remember correctly). Exactly how we achieve this on a piece of stainless steel less than 7mm in diameter (the end of a 10mm wedge bolt) that is intended to be hit with a hammer is not clear and our objections to this have not been answered. CENORM actually though bolts and hangers were always sold as a set so we could mark the hanger showing a certain detatchment from reality!
What benefit there is in marking the length isn´t clear, either they are strong enough or they aren´t and the original installer knew the length anyway. If one fails you´ll know how long it was and to use longer ones (if that will solve the problem). The truth of the matter is virtually no-one actually knows how long the bolts need to be since they never measure it, they just guess and the minimum lengths in EN959 cover probably 95% of bolts installed quite adequately.

So do you know a good site to buy some bolts?

Tristan Burnham wrote:

So do you know a good site to buy some bolts?

Sure, I'm the owner of the German company that supplies TeamTough!

It would be comforting when backing off a choss pile to know just how long/deep those bolts are that have me worried regarding their general outside appearance.  In construction there are building standards for, say how you attach a stick wall to a slab.  Inspectors et al. might benefit as well if there was some symbol giving an idea on depth.  Just a thought/wish.  I get there is only so much space on a bolt head. 

Roy Suggett wrote: It would be comforting when backing off a choss pile to know just how long/deep those bolts are that have me worried regarding their general outside appearance.  In construction there are building standards for, say how you attach a stick wall to a slab.  Inspectors et al. might benefit as well if there was some symbol giving an idea on depth.  Just a thought/wish.  I get there is only so much space on a bolt head. 

Hilti KB bolts have this.  There is a letter that indicates the bolts length right on the head of the bolt (that is exposed after installation).  There is a table in the KB documentation that tie's the letter to a length range.

Roy Suggett wrote: It would be comforting when backing off a choss pile to know just how long/deep those bolts are that have me worried regarding their general outside appearance.  In construction there are building standards for, say how you attach a stick wall to a slab.  Inspectors et al. might benefit as well if there was some symbol giving an idea on depth.  Just a thought/wish.  I get there is only so much space on a bolt head. 

Powers Wedge anchors have a letter on the end of the shaft that tells you how long the bolt is...ie "C" is 2-1/4" iirc.

Fact of the matter, if you recognize the type and size (you should be able to recognize 3/8" or larger wedge v. 5 piece) and you know the rock is sound it really doesn't matter how long the bolt.

ie in Granite anything is pretty much awesome and nearly anything sold is long enough (minimum embed depth of only 1-7/8" typically).

Rotten granite does exist and that is a horse of another color.

I know about those bolts and their symbols for depth...and very much appreciate seeing them.  Thanks anyway. Was hoping all manufactures would get on board.  Not everyone places these so you are left speculating and often in a place where you wish you had more info.

Very informative. Thank you all. Yeah, I figured it was best to just do nothing to them, but they must match the cliffs, especially down low. I have to touch up the bolt head after it's lost most its paint from having been pounded in, and wrenched down tight.  Nothing like another rusty old bolt to ratchet up the spiciness factor...