Half Dome's Snake Dike is being retrobolted - get involved!

Collin H wrote:

Sorry for thread drift, but I have a weird gripe about the use of "boomer" as a dismissive insult, and I'm hoping someone will return the favor in another 30 years or so when people are using "millennial" in the same way.

It's what they use when they lack the imagination to do anything other than call names.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.

NateB wrote:

This what you're planning on using?  If so - sorry bud - this DQ's you from being the right person for this job.  

Hopefully in the mad rush to be the cool kid who saved Half Dome, the patch job doesn't turn out to be 100x worse than the bolting.  What's needed here is special tooling (not a tuning fork) and experience.  Hopefully everyone can be a little patient until that shows up.  It appears Erik has left a for-real challenge.

I've had great results in hell gate limestone, and lil cottie white granite with steelstick. So have many, many other people. The trick is mixing in with small bits of the same rock you're patching on. 

Little trick I learned from James Garrett, who's mentorship is exactly why I feel responsible to get up there and help. Not sure who you are, but it's obvious you dunno what you're talking about. 

As a boomer, I’m not confused and scared regarding changes in climbing. I started climbing with sneakers or leather boots, a length of 1-inch webbing to fashion a swami belt, a couple of biners for rapping, pitons, and belaying by wrapping the rope around my back for friction. Helmet?  Really?  Belaying gloves?  Please. Plastic holds?  Who saw that coming in 1971?  Climbing is totally different today and orders of magnitudes safer, thanks to modern gear.

We don’t need to add bolts to make a climb safer. All old climbs are already safer.  

Charlie Kissick wrote:

As a boomer, I’m not confused and scared regarding changes in climbing. I started climbing with sneakers or leather boots, a length of 1-inch webbing to fashion a swami belt, a couple of biners for rapping, pitons, and belaying by wrapping the rope around my back for friction. Helmet?  Really?  Belaying gloves?  Please. Plastic holds?  Who saw that coming in 1971?  Climbing is totally different today and orders of magnitudes safer, thanks to modern gear.

We don’t need to add bolts to make a climb safer. All old climbs are already safer.  

Yeah I hear this all the time. “Back in my day the only protection we had was rocks we attached to slings. We used to call them rockslings. Freddie Dickson [some obscure person no one had ever heard of] made them in his garage.” And then you continue talking about the right way to climb “your” route with rockslings. Just because you were there first doesn’t mean you own the rock and we all have to climb it with rockslings now. 

reading comprehension is at an all time low

Adam Byra wrote:

Yeah I hear this all the time. “Back in my day the only protection we had was rocks we attached to slings. We used to call them rockslings. Freddie Dickson [some obscure person no one had ever heard of] made them in his garage.” And then you continue talking about the right way to climb “your” route with rockslings. Just because you were there first doesn’t mean you own the rock and we all have to climb it with rockslings now. 

Yeah and I hear it all the time: I'm ENTITLED to do every route I want to do IN ABSOLUTE SAFETY.

I'm ENTITLED to stick clip the second bolt and still say I led the route because, because I want to have led it even though I'm not mentally strong enough to have really done it.

I want to be safe and I'm ENTITLED to it. So all routes have to be dumbed down to my level.

Just because you can't step up to the adventure of it; just because you don't have the ability and the mental strength doesn't mean that you own the rock and every route has to be REDUCED to your comfort level.

NateB wrote:
Russ - can you and your friends read? I have zero respect for so-called craftsman who don't read and follow the manuals and data sheets for their chosen tools and materials. It's right there in plain English so spare me your quip that I don't know what I'm talking about. This epoxy is rated for metal - not rock or masonry. As Salamanizer Ski notes, it fails in rock. I've seen it fail too. I don't know you either, but I don't trust you.

Ironic

People make drama about everything; more and more I understand why route developers and maintainers just say nothing the vast majority of the time. Someone's always gonna complain about something. Steel Stik is all over the Valley and California in general. Maybe sometimes it fails, but I have never had one of my patched holes fail to my knowledge, or any of the others I've seen patched. 

I am happy to admit that there are probably superior products-- I'll definitely be checking out Ski's recommendation. But to say Steel Stik is totally inadequate is just silly. It works fine. 

NateB wrote:

No - random marketing crap doesn't count - and this makes me distrust JB too - you're showing me something from a website developer or who knows.

You have to follow data sheets and the packaging - these are controlled documents.

It depends.

The application here is to fill a hole in granite.  No critical load bearing involved, no moving parts, no high vibration, etc.  So a number of the characterized limits of SteelStik™ Epoxy Putty are vastly excessive:  4000 PSI strength, withstanding 500 PSI water, and temperatures exceeding 350 deg F.

More interesting might be whether it is more prone to separation from the granite hole (and so water penetration) due to expansion / contraction from day-to-day heating / cooling compared to other fillers. 

And for the pro-bolt crowd, these attributes may be helpful when reusing the patched area to install a bolt:  drillable, tap-able, machinable.

NateB wrote:

It's the inattention to detail that annoys me. 

I use Steel Stik because it's what my route maintenance mentors told me to buy. Regardless of the MSDS it's a product that serves this application well. Sometimes in the field experience matters more than what some nerds wrote down in an MSDS. 

Steel Stik is used an awful lot for this purpose and that's fine. 

Brandon R wrote:

Every generation has it's shortfalls. How about the generation that loves something sooooo much that they have to invite all their fake insta-friends and blast it out all over social media until it gets too crowded and trashy and then they don't like it anymore and move to the next destructive project? Is the opposite of gatekeeping... ruining?

This. Yup. All day long. 

A bolt added to 75’ runouts seems reasonable, and in line with FA’s wishes. A couple to prevent a ground fall might be good on first pitch. Can someone sketch a new bolt topo?

It seems like in the future anyone adding bolts should literally sit down with the first ascentionist and sketch it out on paper for clear agreement. It appears the retro bolter went overboard. Clearly they were not on the same page, and this is the issue.

If you turn it into a bolt ladder, no question it will be so crowded one day you will have to enter a lottery for a permit to climb it. Join a Que online, just so you can join another Que at the base of the climb. The Snake Hike/half dome hike remake. 

Brandon R wrote:

Every generation has it's shortfalls. How about the generation that loves something sooooo much that they have to invite all their fake insta-friends and blast it out all over social media until it gets too crowded and trashy and then they don't like it anymore and move to the next destructive project? Is the opposite of gatekeeping... ruining?

This. Yup. All day long. 

Here are some more comments from Eric Beck, one of the first ascentionists:

https://www.yosemiteclimbing.org/campaigns/view-campaign/4WGnZYF4LpZvzz9jeYx5C_sNQ_V_LDbYMNOP77mCQJKdVfco0YOSu5j2FO7rF3MLUXGbpSAJPQyV1tGL5xBaSl128_AeUa3p

Brad Young wrote:

Yeah and I hear it all the time: I'm ENTITLED to do every route I want to do IN ABSOLUTE SAFETY.

I'm ENTITLED to stick clip the second bolt and still say I led the route because, because I want to have led it even though I'm not mentally strong enough to have really done it.

I want to be safe and I'm ENTITLED to it. So all routes have to be dumbed down to my level.

Just because you can't step up to the adventure of it; just because you don't have the ability and the mental strength doesn't mean that you own the rock and every route has to be REDUCED to your comfort level.

If I had a nickel for every time an old person used the word entitled, I'd have enough money to buy a full set of rockslings. 

I like girls first, granite second and limestone third.

Underwood family wrote:

A bolt added to 75’ runouts seems reasonable, and in line with FA’s wishes. A couple to prevent a ground fall might be good on first pitch. Can someone sketch a new bolt topo?

It seems like in the future anyone adding bolts should literally sit down with the first ascentionist and sketch it out on paper for clear agreement. It appears the retro bolter went overboard. Clearly they were not on the same page, and this is the issue.

If you turn it into a bolt ladder, no question it will be so crowded one day you will have to enter a lottery for a permit to climb it. Join a Que online, just so you can join another Que at the base of the climb. The Snake Hike/half dome hike remake. 

I would personally  not plan for any of those new bolts to be there when/if you climb the route in the future, no matter what any new topo says.

these type of things have a way of regulating themselves in this neck of the wooods.  Be safe out there

Brad Young wrote:

Yeah and I hear it all the time: I'm ENTITLED to do every route I want to do IN ABSOLUTE SAFETY.

I'm ENTITLED to stick clip the second bolt and still say I led the route because, because I want to have led it even though I'm not mentally strong enough to have really done it.

I want to be safe and I'm ENTITLED to it. So all routes have to be dumbed down to my level.

Just because you can't step up to the adventure of it; just because you don't have the ability and the mental strength doesn't mean that you own the rock and every route has to be REDUCED to your comfort level.

I'm not sure who you're hearing saying that. I haven't seen it in this thread or the "Half Dome has fallen" thread. 

For my part, I've said that it's up to Yosemite locals to decide, here's my perspective and here are my reasons, please consider it. I didn't advocate anything about comfort levels, but rather using minimal bolting for life safety as a yardstick. I saw general condemnation of Erik Sloan's unilateral action to overbolt. I saw solid agreement that sport bolting is inappropriate for Snake Dike.

There are good reasons to add a few bolts, and on the other hand there are good reasons to revert back to the bolting that has been in place for decades, and each climber is going to weigh the pros and cons differently. 

At the end of the day, rebolting and retrobolting are happening and will continue to happen in Yosemite. I've seen it in just my couple of decades visiting. Old bolts are replaced. Failing historic pitons are backed up or replaced with bolts. New bolted anchors are installed to save trees that served as historic rap stations. The community may decide additional bolts are warranted on some climbs, whether because of FA wishes, accidents, slouging and polish that change the nature of the climbing, or other reasons. 

What's most important is that we have an agreed-upon way for the community to come together, to listen to each other and consider proposals, and to make decisions that are not going to erupt in bolt wars. 

I'm ENTITLED to stick clip the second bolt and still say I led the route because, because I want to have led it even though I'm not mentally strong enough to have really done it.

Once again, someone demonstrates that they know nothing about the modern use of stick clips on sport routes.

Marc801 C wrote: Brad Young wrote:

Once again, someone demonstrates that they know nothing about the modern use of stick clips on sport routes.

I don’t think a trad climber is going to find it offensive that they don’t know enough about stick clipping sport routes.

And you’ve got to admit the rest of his points are pretty spot on.