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Chockstone Forum - Accidents & Injuries

Report Accidents and Injuries

 Page 1 of 9. Messages 1 to 20 | 21 to 40 | 41 to 60 | 61 to 80 | 81 to 100 | 101 to 120 | 121 to 140 | 141 to 160 | 161 to 174
Author
biner breaks on Forever Young
ben wiessner
7-Dec-2011
9:32:04 PM
My mate Rob was climbing Forever Young at Koalasquatsy Wall, Grampians, when he had a rather nasty experience. He found placing the 4th draw on lead to be rather taxing, so he took a jump a little way above the 3rd bolt. In the process of falling the top biner of the 3rd draw snapped. So he fell a fair way larger than expected, was flipped upside-down, ending up with his head a foot off the deck. He reports feeling shaken, but not stirred.



We thought that the primary reason for the biner snapping was that the ring bolts are too deeply recessed. The result of this is that a biner clipped into it is unable to rotate freely, and can end up getting loaded in nasty manner (there's a good chance this has been covered in another thread?). It seems the first bolt is the most deeply recessed of all the bolts, so I took a photo to show how tight it is.



I was thinking that this problem could be rectified by drilling out the rock behind the ring to create more space? It would be kinda ugly, but it's the best idea I could come up with.

As covered in another thread this route also needs the anchors fixed up (I think it's amongst KP's priority list). Once these issues have been sorted I recommend everyone jump on cos it's a marvellous route.

shortman
7-Dec-2011
9:47:28 PM
Trippy, I've wondered about this b4.

IdratherbeclimbingM9
7-Dec-2011
9:53:22 PM
Your pic shows the krab broke at the rope-basket end, but your second pic shows a problem at the bolt-end.
~> Forgive my confusion, but this seems to me to be two different issues?

I look forward to the Chockstone opinion as to 'Why is it so?' (shades of Proff. Julius Summner Miller)!
citationx
7-Dec-2011
9:58:07 PM
On 7/12/2011 IdratherbeclimbingM9 wrote:
>Your pic shows the krab broke at the rope-basket end, but your second pic
>shows a problem at the bolt-end.
>~> Forgive my confusion, but this seems to me to be two different issues?
>
>I look forward to the Chockstone opinion as to 'Why is it so?' (shades
>of Proff. Julius Summner Miller)!

Doesn't appear to be a different orientation to me.
(and regardless of it being different, the "rope basket" end would probably be thicker laterally, making this an even tighter squeeze imho)

southcol
7-Dec-2011
10:02:26 PM
That looks nasty. I have often wondered about that scenario but never heard of it.
M9, I would assume that normally the biner is clipped with the 'rope basket end' oriented upwards, unless clipping carrots/removable plates where an inversion is favourable..

nmonteith
7-Dec-2011
10:03:31 PM
Wow - scary! 1000 apologies and I'm glad no one was injured. I do think that just drilling (or chiseling) out the rock between the u-bolt legs should fix this problem. I'm trying to remember what sort of bolts these were, I think they were the threaded stainless u-bolts sold through Climbing Anchors around 2005/06?
ben wiessner
7-Dec-2011
10:03:32 PM
On 7/12/2011 IdratherbeclimbingM9 wrote:
>Your pic shows the krab broke at the rope-basket end, but your second pic
>shows a problem at the bolt-end.

I don't know what led you to infer that the broken biner was at the rope-basket end. It was the top biner of the draw that broke ie the bolt-end biner. Does that help clarify?
ben wiessner
7-Dec-2011
10:09:55 PM
On 7/12/2011 nmonteith wrote:
>Wow - scary! 1000 apologies and I'm glad no one was injured.

Hey Neil, that's very kind but no need to apologise IMO :)

IdratherbeclimbingM9
7-Dec-2011
10:16:43 PM
On 7/12/2011 ben wiessner wrote:
>On 7/12/2011 IdratherbeclimbingM9 wrote:
>>Your pic shows the krab broke at the rope-basket end, but your second
>pic
>>shows a problem at the bolt-end.
>
>I don't know what led you to infer that the broken biner was at the rope-basket
>end. It was the top biner of the draw that broke ie the bolt-end biner.
>Does that help clarify?

Hmm.
The confusion in communication is due to our differing perceptions of what we call our 'normal' clipping behaviour.

Regardless of it being the top krab of the quickdraw, it is still the 'basket' end of the krab involved from my old fashioned perspective, as I usually rotate my krabs on the pro (irrespective of type), to align with old fashioned procedures!
I do understand how you have clipped the U-bolt now, and agree that what you/your partner have experienced is still a worry, and look forward to Mikl perhaps adding this configuration of krab obstruction/orientation to his testing regime in the future.

E. Wells
8-Dec-2011
12:20:44 AM
I always girth my u-bolt with dyneema then clip a screamer to it, wear a helmet and place a crashpad. No excuses for poor planning.
paulmilliken
8-Dec-2011
5:26:40 AM
Alternatively, a stainless-steel oval shackle could be permanently left on the ringbolt.
mikllaw
8-Dec-2011
9:06:08 AM
I think the "V" slot formed between the rock and the lower part of the eye jambs the biner. The biner can easily be jambed away from its major load axis, then you've lost 2/3rds of the strength. In this artistic creation, the load is concentrated away from the spine of the biner where the arrow points.

Chiselling is hard work, a drill then some neat chiselling (+ safety glasses) would work. Thats a lot of shackles to leave behind if you were to fix all of them.

In general, semicircular eyes are more prone to this than a square form (with rounded angles. Big eyes tend to get buried more and form the dangerous acute angle, while smaller eyes can't be buried that deeply as you couldn't clip anything into them.

Top- square form has an included angle of 90 degrees
Middle- big eye has an included angle of ~40 degrees
bottom - small eye has an included angle of ~70 degrees

Sometimes the eye is sitting in a dish so that the biner touches rock on either side,and is being pulled apart by the eye.

Moral, watch what you're doing when placing and clipping rings. We can always get it wrong, and so can you.

What to do if there is a crucial Ubolt or ring that might be a biner breaker? maybe clip it, make sure the biner is sitting loaded at the axis AND thread a byneema sling also
robby
8-Dec-2011
2:55:59 PM
I believe the problematic bolt is the smallest of the 3, but it wasnt in its normal position when I fell. The broken biner was above horizontal and turned ever so slightly which made it impossible for the biner to return to a normal position during the fall because of the space between. so the top curve of the biner was literally twisted off, I'm sure this doesnt take much because I felt absolutely no take in the rope as I heard the snap.
mikllaw
8-Dec-2011
5:03:08 PM
scary stuff.
makes trad seem like a safe option

nmonteith
8-Dec-2011
5:29:00 PM
On 8/12/2011 mikllaw wrote:
>makes trad seem like a safe option

Funnily enough i actually led the first ascent of this route on trad (after some drill disaster occurred and I didn't want to wait until the next weekend for the tick). The bolts were placed weeks afterwards - so i never actually used them myself!

benjenga
8-Dec-2011
10:00:21 PM
It begs the question..... If it was led on gear then why bolt.
Ps what grade is this route?
Tommo
9-Dec-2011
4:13:00 AM
On 8/12/2011 benjenga wrote:
>It begs the question..... If it was led on gear then why bolt.
>Ps what grade is this route?

I was waiting for that one ;o)

Pass the popcorn...

nmonteith
9-Dec-2011
8:35:18 AM
On 8/12/2011 benjenga wrote:
>It begs the question..... If it was led on gear then why bolt.

Well I intended to make it a sport route originally. It's wall climbing with a few horizontals that take cams. The top moves (the grade 24 crux) are well above the last gear and quite desperate to figure out. Of course I had rapped the route, sussed the holds and protection and top-roped it. So I had a massive advantage. I thought the route deserved lots of ascents so I equipped it for repeats, not as a monument to a giant ego. Of course some people will think that's controversial but whatever. There are plenty of sport routes you can lead on trad gear if you wanted to. Anything on the nearby Amnesty Wall is a prime example - those routes have a tonne more trad options than Forever Young.
mikllaw
9-Dec-2011
8:40:02 AM
On 9/12/2011 nmonteith wrote:
> There are plenty of sport routes you can lead on trad gear if you wanted to.

or solo, why didn't i think of that. It's so much cheaper than bolting OR owning trad gear.
kieranl
9-Dec-2011
10:57:42 AM
On 9/12/2011 mikllaw wrote:
>or solo, why didn't i think of that. It's so much cheaper than bolting
>OR owning trad gear.
... and life is much too long

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There are 174 messages in this topic.

 

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