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Mt Arapiles Camp Ground Users Group 10-Sep-2015 At 4:38:00 PM IdratherbeclimbingM9

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On 10/09/2015 martym wrote:
>On 31/08/2015 IdratherbeclimbingM9 wrote:
>>On 30/08/2015 phillipivan wrote:
>>>We need one of these:
>>>
>>Hmm.
>>I am not too sure about the new generation bouldering brigade (what has
>>climbing become?), being too enamoured of a monument to aid, especially
>>at Arapiles...
>>~> and besides, who needs monuments when we still have living practitioners
>>of the dark art?
>>;-)
>
>Do you still bash in pitons?
>
>There's a fair few at Araps so I don't think the monument would go unappreciated
>- though Dec Crag is probably considered a monument in it's own right...
>Then there's Plaque wall and the Gums toilet door!
>And of course coming from Sydney, we always stop at the dog on the tucker
>box and big koala...
>I'm sure Dave Jones has considered something in the past - he's probably
>collected enough booty to sculpt a whole climber statue with moving joints..

I second DJ doing a sculpture!

Warning: thread hijack ahead.
Re
>Do you still bash in pitons?

These days a more specific definition of piton is required as things have evolved considerably since the days of the lost arrow as depicted in pi's posted pic...

The truth for me is a qualified yes.
The qualification is as follows;
I strive (extremely hard) to climb clean-aid where-ever possible, as that is the personal challenge I set myself some 25 years ago.
As an example, I can only think of 4 occasions in the past since then, that I have driven a piton by hammer.

1. I set two consecutive rurps on a new route at Buffalo, when I wimped out due to the numerous clean-mank placements hand placed below me and a groundfall potential result if I fell from that height...
A post (PM?) by an original attemptee of that route (congratulating me on my ascent), indicated to me that they took a groundfall off the same route years earlier from the crux(?), with driven aid below, without finishing that ascent, and they lost their pitons due to them pinging out into the scrub...
2. I placed a knifeblade in a rotten flared crack at the base of a roped-solo climb I did at Buffalo as a ground anchor, after I could not get any new-fangled clean gear to stick at that point for that subsequent ascent.
3. I demonstrated to a Buffalo Aid Weekend participant the art of 'setting' a piton, in a non-worthwhile-climbable bit of rock, ... read less than two metres high.
4. I set a piton as a temporary bail item on a climb at Buffalo during an ascent once. This piton was subsequently cleaned when my second and myself re-ascended to that point, and subsequently completed the climb.

I often still climb with my Chouinard hammer as it is an excellent nut tool!

The new equivalents of pitons are beaks of various brands, and although they can be driven by hammer, I have found that they are equally effective for height gain when hand placed...

PS If you want an example of non bolt/non piton use on my part, look up 'Lizards And Talons Are Your Friends', put up at Buffalo on an Aidfest weekend with Ben_E some time back; ~> I seriously doubt it will receive a second lead-ascent any time soon...
;-)
... end of thread hijack.