Taiwan Nov. 1-6

I'm going to be in Taiwan from the 1st to the 6th of November, and I'm considering going to Long Dong. I have a rope and draws but no gear; I've never done trad, only sport up to mid-5.10. Anybody around?

I also would love to hear about anybody's experiences camping in this area. Thanks!

Camping is technically not allowed, but has never been enforced as far as I know. There are a few options for camping, depending on wind. The best camping spots are most easily accessed from the Temple parking area (accessed from the bus stop just after the tunnel) rather than hiking in from the He Mei elementary school parking area (the first crag bus stop going east on highway 2).

1. There is some flat ground at the parking area up the hill from the Matsu temple. This is the most convenient and fairly well protected from winds. However, be prepared to get a very early start or risk being gawped at by busloads of Mainland tourists. It is also the least scenic of the camping spots.

2. On the overlook trail, there are a few gazebos and flat grassy ground nearby. If winds are calm and there is no rain, this is one of the more comfortable areas. Also, it offers downright stunning views in the morning, as it faces east.

3. There are a few good camping spots around the Second Cave area. This is most easily accessed by hiking down the steep Golden Valley trail and heading climber's right (north along the coast). You can set up in the sandy Second Cave itself to take shelter from wind and rain, but be aware that the roof has been known to drop some pretty big blocks from time to time. You can also walk a few hundred feet towards the sea and set up on the only sandy beach in the area.

4. If you have some nice camping pads, there are many flat, but rocky, areas all along the crag. You can access these easily from the He Mei Elementary entrance. There are some spots that are walled off from the wind, and these would be very comfortable in November, barring any rain. If the squid boats are out, much of these areas are brightly lit, which can be either pretty cool or annoying, depending on your personal tastes.

Lastly, there are some rooms for rent in the fishing village at the School entrance, as well as a climber's hostel a few kilometers up the road (The Bivy).

Good luck finding a partner! It will be much easier if you speak some Chinese, but finding English speaking or western partners is pretty simple too. If you show up alone on a weekend, finding partners is a snap. Just beware the sketchy Taiwanese belay and safety ethic... (my apologies to all my non-sketchy Taiwanese friends!)

This was my local crag for 3 years. Really fun climbing. Grippy at this time of year. And you can't beat the location.

Don't sweat not having trad gear...kinda. Everything's bolted. But I will say that gear is recommended for backing up some lines since there has been bolt failure there in recent years. Your best bet is to consult with Taiwan Climbing Calendar on Facebook and TaiwanRocks.net. There, you will find partners (Jim, Nate, and Danger are all well informed, fun local climbers), and can find an excel doc outlining each climb's bolt status. If you're lucky, your partner will probably have pieces to bring up some "questionable" climbs.

Camping. Go to second cave. Especially if you're there only a weekend, it's the LD experience. If people are camping (which is getting rarer and rarer these days from what I've heard), that's usually where they'll go. It's made for camping. It's safe (I slept there 2 nights during a typhoon), centralized, and you can always walk to the water and sleep under the stars if it's nice out. Plus you wake up next to the climbs and not next to hikers at the top. Just be sure to bring your next day's water and food in as hiking out and back in is a pain. Though I often did for cold beer and to kill time. If you decide to, there's a small house/shop at the school entrance that closes at 8ish but no "town."

If camping doesn't do it for you there is a climbers hostel, The Bivy, a mile or two down the road. They opened right as I left so not sure how crowded it gets or how getting back and forth is.

Really, just hit up Taiwan Climbing Calendar. You'll find partners easily enough and they'll steer you in the right direction. Just don't get caught up with noobs who only climb the same 3 climbs at Golden Valley.

Thanks for the info guys!

Don't go until you read this thread.

mountainproject.com/v/are-b…

Taiwanrocks.net has links to a database that is continually updated with route and bolt info. John is right - there are quite a few sport routes at LD that are sporting dangerous bolts. However, most of the well-tread classics, especially in the 5.10 range, in popular areas should be more or less updated by now. Don't take my word for it though, and use the guidebook plus, the knowledge of whatever local climbers you hook up with, and your own judgement.

BrianWS wrote:Taiwanrocks.net has links to a database that is continually updated with route and bolt info. John is right - there are quite a few sport routes at LD that are sporting dangerous bolts. However, most of the well-tread classics, especially in the 5.10 range, in popular areas should be more or less updated by now. Don't take my word for it though, and use the guidebook plus, the knowledge of whatever local climbers you hook up with, and your own judgement.

I agree. Visiting climbers will need to evaluate each route individually based on local input and, better yet, an understanding of what suspect bolts look like.

On Taiwanrocks.net there are several places where it seems they don't fully understand what's going on. For example:

"Last year the discovery that some older Petzl Collinox bolts previously believed to be made of marine grade 316 stainless steel were in fact, made of 304, shook the Taiwan climbing community and meant many more routes were now suspect."

Anyone who still believes that 316 stainless is significantly better than 304 in a seaside cliff needs to wake up.

"Hence, we started to develop our own titanium bolt. We have decided that besides than the standard EN959 strength test, we will also perform the ASTM-B368 (CASS) copper-accelerated acetic acid salt spray test to simulate 50 years of seaside corrosion, then perform further pull test to ensure a long service life (We’re still working on adding another corrosion resistant test “ASTM-G36 Boiling Magnesium Chloride Test”)."

My thoughts here:

1) ASTM-G36 has been done many times on Grade 2 Ti. I don't see what they expect to gain by repeating it, unless they are considering Grade 5, and the consensus is that Grade 5 is not a good choice.

2) ASTM-B368. I just looked this up, and it doesn't seem applicable. It's designed for evaluating electroplated coatings over a base metal, and simulating corrostion from fog and sea spray. But it was shown first by Sjong and duplicated in the lab by Prosek, that low humidity promotes SCC in 300-stainless. In other words, it's when the bolts DRY OUT that the corrosion occurs, so this test is superfluous.

So FWIW, they don't seem to be up on the current knowledge.

It's general stubbornness from some of the self appointed experts. These are the same guys who installed uneven bolt anchors and got pissed when a foreigner suggested adding chain to equalize them. There are some local climbers involved in metallurgy and manufacturing, and I assume the home grown solutions are cheaper than ti bolts currently on the market.

Long story short: use caution. If you have experience placing gear, bring some to back up bolts if in doubt - many of the fully bolted routes could safely be done as pure trad or mixed lines.

To the OP, hopefully you have contacted the TCC and hooked up with some folks to climb with.

John and Brian... sometimes I think I've lost my mind dealing with this issue "on the ground" as it were. And then you guys bring the objective perspective that echoes what I've been trying to say for years. The strangest thing about it all is that even the most connected, knowledgable, traveled locals - some of our mutual acquaintances, Brian - are only willing to parrot the platitudes that serve to excuse the utter lack of action taken over the last three years (since titanium was finally accepted as the material of choice) and the lack of standardization or official, transparent leadership. Everyone who has voiced dissent or taken any action has either stopped expecting anything, given up climbing because of the overwhelming egos of the scene, or been ostracized from every social circle. The latter even includes one of the formerly most respected and strongest climbers and local guides (not actually Taiwanese) who has rebolted many popular trad route anchors with titanium at his own expense. Indeed, the whole thing defies logic... but logic, facts, expertise have never been as important as "respect" and "relationships" (the Confucian principles of obedience to elders and social harmony) through this whole process.

In July last year we had a double anchor failure on a popular route. This was another dramatic reminder of the necessity for rebolting. A month later, a plan was announced and fundraising began. They were still planning to use Titan Climbing bolts then. Months went by with nothing happening. Then in March this year, someone (referenced above) started rebolting on their own. Suddenly the "team" announced that they had been trying to get Ti bolts made locally. They had found a manufacturer that specialized in Gr5 Ti (apparently this was tested by Sjong as well and passed G36) which is stronger but less resistant to SCC. The argument was that Titan's bolts weren't strong enough and didn't have a guaranteed lifetime. Hence the CASS test which "guaranteed" 50 year lifespan. This bolt would be cast as opposed to forged, bent, or welded, and would be 12mm. The yield strength, the most important indicator of strength to the "team", exceeded 25kn, meaning its breaking strength likely exceeds 70kn. The EN and UIAA rate hardware by its breaking strength for various reasons, most simply because metal fatigue is not a real concern for ductile metals. In the end, they decided to go with Gr64 Ti (a more expensive version of Gr5 with higher SCC resistance than Gr5, but still lower than Gr2) which brought the final cost per bolt to around US $22. This does not include the costs of the various tests (they have since done the G36 test, which was not the one recommended by Alan Jarvis, which it passed) as well as the prototypes. No other QA measures have been taken that I am aware of. The minimum order is 1000. However, pull testing has found only ~50 bolts to be "unsafe" and has passed the couple hundred others that have been tested. It is still unclear how long the team will leave "passed" bolts in, though Alan has suggested the time a bolt could propagate to failure is sooner than it would be retested (a few weeks vs months if not years at the rate things are going now). Currently only 304 bolts are being tested, and these have not been completed (200+ tested has taken over six months, 100+ more to go). 316 should be tested next year (1500+). All rebolting will be done with a core-drill which, for a 10mm glue-in, takes the team 80 minutes in a square concrete block on the ground. Apparently it has been attempted on a failed bolt on a route without success. This is where the process currently stands.

I have been told that suggesting we return to a buy-as-needed basis from Titan and discussing the possibility of stopping the pull testing for time better spent rebolting and lack of any certainty of safety, only bolting select sport routes, and chopping others that can be done on gear would be "too insulting to the team" and "too complicated to find consensus". In the meantime, the team is paying for the bolts out of their own deep pockets.

The guy mentioned above had 500 Titan U-bolts paid for by Black Diamond Taiwan. He still has a majority of them. The team also still has over 100 Eterna bolts from 2014 that seem to have disappeared into the ether.

Can't wait to get back to climbing in the high desert of Oregon, where folks did it right the first time... most of the time.

Sorry to hear that face-saving and other ancient-minded cultural bullshit (half Chinese so I can say it...) have gotten completely in the way of maintaining one of the most beautiful climbing areas in the world. Time to leave it behind and focus on actually climbing, glad you can enjoy what matters soon.

To the OP, did you make it out to LD?

What a disaster. Especially since Titan Climbing bolts are certified to every standard the UIAA has, including Class One corrosion resistance, and cost half of what their bolt does.

Makes you want to slap 'em upside the head and ask, "WTF is wrong with you?!"

John Byrnes wrote:What a disaster. Especially since Titan Climbing bolts are certified to every standard the UIAA has, including Class One corrosion resistance, and cost half of what their bolt does. Makes you want to slap 'em upside the head and ask, "WTF is wrong with you?!"

Titan Climbing bolts are certified to EN959, they are not "certified" by the UIAA for anything and do not hold a UIAA safety label. There is no "Class 1" or anything else in their requirements anyway.
Clearly some Taiwanese are bonkers though!

Jim Titt wrote: Titan Climbing bolts are certified to EN959, they are not "certified" by the UIAA for anything and do not hold a UIAA safety label. There is no "Class 1" or anything else in their requirements anyway. Clearly some Taiwanese are bonkers though!

It's true that the Titan bolts only hold EN certification, but it's also true that they are the only bolt on the market currently with a proven, flawless track record in Class 1 environments, which is not an official thing YET, but Alan has used it enough in our discussions for it to have become a standard for real-life scenarios we are dealing with. Long Dong actually falls into Class 2 - SCC is present but not at the dramatically accelerated rates of Tonsai, etc.

Interestingly, though other types of steel (duplex, etc) have not been considered by the team, there has been the suggestion that "other factors" are contributing to the bolt failures. Some even refuse to acknowledge that the brittle failure points are obvious indicators. In which case, why is titanium necessary? During the mass rebolting in 2011-2013, folks were still convinced that 316 was perfectly fine, thanks in no small part to the stash of locally-made bolts and the word of an expat metallurgist who had done some rebolting himself. This is all to say that the team isn't following any kind of step-by-step thought process in arriving at its conclusions. Alan has been basically ignored and it seems some kind of antipathy towards Martin (didn't refund but exchanged year-old bolts, a few of which sprung tack welds) is what motivated the switch to finding a local manufacturer.

My main concern now is with the blind trust in a company that does not make climbing hardware, and is only doing this with profit in mind. I can't see any other motivation on their end - nobody is seeking to get these bolts certified for mass sale. Martin has spoken at length about the QA measures he takes to ensure that his raw material and final product will perform as advertised. I don't have access to what he said now but it was impressive. I have asked the team what kind of assurances they or the manufacturer can provide, especially given the complex nature of the alloy they have chosen and the relative messiness of casting versus other means of production. Quite likely my questions are heard with a degree of cynicism and dismissal after all the "trouble" I've caused them - nobody else speaks up, really - which might explain why I haven't received any response. Or maybe there just aren't any, and the irony of critiquing one to the point of conspiracy and holding up the other as the holy grail is lost on the obedient and harmonized fund-providers. Taiwan island mentality on fine display.

Well most people actually ignore Alan and his endless search for perfection at any cost! I´m part of the working group and mailed him the other day but don´t agree with most of what he says and particularly the reasons for his decisions.

The debate and disagreement amongst the activists you´ve outlined above is reflected in other areas which is why I keep away from the titanium market altogether, the customers are too much hassle for the amount of business generated.

Casting Gr6 titanium isn´t exactly a back-yard operation, I´d expect a compny producing components that way to have far higher QC levels than Martin does though his are probably perfectly adequate.
Incidentally when comparing prices of locally produced items to imported ones the relevant import and sales taxes along with shipping needs to be considered, for Taiwan it adds about 30% to the price, for Thailand considerably more (for Brazil it more or less doubles the price). So a stronger, locally produced bolt in a better alloy for $22 isn´t actually that bad.

Jim Titt wrote:Well most people actually ignore Alan and his endless search for perfection at any cost!

Funny thing is, the locals are on the same - if not more pedantic - search for perfection. I suggested that we use Titan Eterna bolts and buy them on an as-needed basis. There is already enough money for that and then some. But apparently they were considered "not strong enough", and thus three years have passed and here we are...

Jim Titt wrote:I keep away from the titanium market altogether, the customers are too much hassle for the amount of business generated.

If we knew what material would be better, I'm sure someone would be trying to find a way to get it produced locally for less. It has been a ridiculous hassle, especially given the availability of a proven (and cheaper) alternative.

Jim Titt wrote:Casting Gr6 titanium isn´t exactly a back-yard operation, I´d expect a compny producing components that way to have far higher QC levels than Martin does though his are probably perfectly adequate.

Well, Martin is getting it done in Sheffield, which does have a reputation of its own. You would think the Taiwan company's QC is better, but there has still not been any explanation of what this might be. Doesn't seem like there's any good reason to hide the details.

Jim Titt wrote:Incidentally when comparing prices of locally produced items to imported ones the relevant import and sales taxes along with shipping needs to be considered, for Taiwan it adds about 30% to the price... So a stronger, locally produced bolt in a better alloy for $22 isn´t actually that bad.

When considering bulk discount, taxes, and shipping, the prices come out to 320NTD (Eterna) and 700NTD (local). I know this from the local team's reported expenses. The most significant differences, aside from QC assurances, is the breaking strength of the bolt, 75kn+ versus 50kn, and the resistance to SCC, which is in favor of the commercially-pure Gr2. I'm not sure how "stronger" is really a selling point given that the only mechanism for bolt failure here is from SCC. Nobody has yet pointed out any other possibility for failure, and thus, at least as far as I'm concerned (and it seems to be the same everywhere else that has SCC issues), the Titan Eterna bolt is the best option available.