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bozeb
Dec 29, 2008, 1:40 AM
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I am wondering if anyone knows of some literature about the ideal spacing between bolts/pro. I am thinking that there must be someone who has actually figured out what the ideal spacing is, and I just want to know. I know there are a lot of variables in climbing but some things can be figured out... looking for some help here. (I have read "Rope System Analysis" by Stephen W. Attaway, and though it is very insightful, it doesn't deal with the spacing...) Thanks for your time. Peace. bb
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sungam
Dec 29, 2008, 1:50 AM
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Just like the climbing, access, and route quality, the rock dictates the best bolt spacing. The best bolted routes have varying distances between the bolts - the bolts are at the most comfortable/efficient stances within reason. As for trad - protect when you can and need or want.
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rockforlife
Dec 29, 2008, 1:55 AM
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I would say space them out so you don't deck... unless you into that sort of thing or better yet
hafilax wrote: The first bolt should be at 3m and the following bolts spaced by exactly 2m. Non adherence will result in being summarily tarred and feathered after a severe tongue lashing. All bolts will be chopped and public access for the crag denied indefinitely.
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rocknice2
Dec 29, 2008, 2:03 AM
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bozeb wrote: I am wondering if anyone knows of some literature about the ideal spacing between bolts/pro. I am thinking that there must be someone who has actually figured out what the ideal spacing is, and I just want to know. I know there are a lot of variables in climbing but some things can be figured out... looking for some help here. (I have read "Rope System Analysis" by Stephen W. Attaway, and though it is very insightful, it doesn't deal with the spacing...) Thanks for your time. Peace. bb There is lots of data regarding bolts. Placements should be spread apart 2x depth of bolt for max strength. 1x depth of bolt = 50% reduction in strength. This is the strength of the concrete not the bolt itself. When bolts blowout the substructure they blow out a cone, so you don't want to overlap the cones http://www.powers.com/...mechanical/06914.pdf Reason would dictate that this would apply to trad gear. Although there are many other factors that come into play when placing pro.
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carpenter
Dec 29, 2008, 2:33 AM
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Try to keep two good pieces of pro between you and the ground. Don't know of any literature saying so. "Ideal" is relative.
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adatesman
Dec 29, 2008, 6:04 AM
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bozeb
Dec 29, 2008, 6:19 AM
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adatesman wrote: To the OP, do you mean bolt spacing as in between two bolts in a multipitch anchor or spacing between bolts on a route? Spacing between bolts (or pro) on a route. I don't really care about the actual placement, just the best distance from the ground to the first piece and from that first piece to the second piece... etc.
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Maddhatter
Dec 29, 2008, 8:47 AM
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bozeb wrote: adatesman wrote: To the OP, do you mean bolt spacing as in between two bolts in a multipitch anchor or spacing between bolts on a route? Spacing between bolts (or pro) on a route. I don't really care about the actual placement, just the best distance from the ground to the first piece and from that first piece to the second piece... etc. In reply to: It's nice if you will not deck if you fall clipping any other bolt then the first. Work it out dude there is no set number.First bolt is 10' 2nd is 20' you fall clipping the 2nd you deck. Just keep in mind that if you are asking this you are not ready to bolt anything. high first ,shorter 2nd, then don't run out the 3rd until it grounds you out. Almost every line will be different.
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JimTitt
Dec 29, 2008, 11:08 AM
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The French have done this, there is a leaflet from COSIROC/FFME (if I remember rightly) with the recommended bolt spacings for childrens routes, sport routes and alpine. From memory for normal sport routes it is 2,8m for the first then 1,2 then 2m then 3-4m for the rest. This is why French sport routes have a reputation of being a bit over-bolted! Of course it depends on what criteria you set as "ideal". From a theoretical point the only criteria is that a faller doesn´t hit the ground when belayer slack, clipping slack, rope stretch and slip at the belay device are taken into account. This is the basis of the above. As regards the rope and bolt strength the spacing is irrelevant. For natural protection there is no point in making a theoretical analysis since any values will depend on the quality and availability of the placements and these are uncontrollable variables. If you think these variables can be fixed then "Measurement of Dynamic Rope System Stiffness in a Sequential Failure for Lead Climbing Falls" by Beverly/Attaway contains all the basics to calculate what you need when you have decided what "ideal" means!
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onceahardman
Dec 29, 2008, 8:20 PM
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Really nice cheesetitting. Anyway, I agree with sungam, it depends on the rock. Measuring distances will put placements in spots with unnecessarily awkward clips. Put the bolts: 1) In the best rock, 2) Where the clip is not the crux, 3) Close enough where a blown clip does not result in a groundfall. Sport routes are not known for their boldness.
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sungam
Dec 29, 2008, 8:34 PM
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onceahardman wrote: I agree with sungam A first! Jut kidding. Another few notes: - Be cunning with your bolt placements, but keep shorter people in mind. For example, Breakfast Burrito at the red river gorge. A popular route, has the cover shot for the guide, but has one strange clip on it. Where the route goes left, up, then back right the bolt is right in the middle of the little C - meaning you make a move to a pocket with your left, then reach way up to clip the bolt. Shorter people often have issues with this move, but it saves you having to make a silly runout or breaking this next rule/guideline: -keep the bolts in a (at least relatively) straight line as much as possible. Dog legs increase rope drag a surprising amount, so avoid as much as possible.
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peon
Dec 30, 2008, 12:48 AM
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onceahardman wrote: Really nice cheesetitting. Irrelavant, but what the hell is Cheesetitting??? best I can figure it's either giving information just to pacify someone (correct or otherwise) or f---ing with them. Please edumicate me.
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sungam
Dec 30, 2008, 1:07 AM
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peon wrote: onceahardman wrote: Really nice cheesetitting. Irrelavant, but what the hell is Cheesetitting??? best I can figure it's either giving information just to pacify someone (correct or otherwise) or f---ing with them. This is a cheesetit. Notice the fooked up mark-up and text placement. Please edumicate me.[/quote
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mojomonkey
Dec 30, 2008, 1:52 PM
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bozeb wrote: I am wondering if anyone knows of some literature about the ideal spacing between bolts/pro. I am thinking that there must be someone who has actually figured out what the ideal spacing is, and I just want to know. I know there are a lot of variables in climbing but some things can be figured out... looking for some help here. (I have read "Rope System Analysis" by Stephen W. Attaway, and though it is very insightful, it doesn't deal with the spacing...) Thanks for your time. Peace. bb Ideal is a tricky word. Closest I've see was in Traditional Lead Climbing: A Rock Climber's Guide to Taking the Sharp End of the Rope by Heidi Pesterfield. It includes a section on placement frequency starting on page 137, copied below (except I fixed a typo; it said 5 inches instead of 5 feet).
Traditional Lead Climbing by Heidi Pesterfield wrote: As a climber new to gear-leading, place protection frequently, particularly in the first 25 feet of the route to reduce the load of a potential fall. (Loads in relation to fall-severity ratings [fall factors] are detailed in a subsequent chapter on falling in this chapter.) If, purely from a fall-factor perspective, you establish the optimal number of placements, the size of your required rack would anchor you to the ground. However, climber and metallurgist Steve Paterson of Los Gatos, California, has created a formula based on physics equations you can follow to keep potential fall factors reasonably low. His data suggests that placing protection approximately every 5 feet (1.5 meters) for the first 25 feet (7.5 meters) and then every 10-20 feet (3-6 meters) for the remainder of the pitch significantly minimizes forces, assuming each piece is placed and runnered correctly. this requires approximately one to two dozen pieces per pitch. (This guideline should not prevent you from placing additional pieces to protect cruxes--difficult moves--and potential ground, or ledge, falls.) They don't specify what they consider low enough fall factors to be acceptable, but you could calculate what you would end up with using the above guide...
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onceahardman
Dec 30, 2008, 5:48 PM
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In reply to: Ideal is a tricky word. Exactly. Climbing, even spurt climbing, is part science, but also partly art. If somebody decides to bolt according to some arcane formula /editorial(such as you'd find under a government-funded bolting program)editorial/, you'd end up with bolts where it was hard to clip them. I'm all for clipping from the most comfy stances, plus I think that is safer-less chance of a blown clip. Plus, there are places where it's better to have two bolts spaced more closely, if it's a long way to the next good stance.
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gunkiemike
Dec 30, 2008, 6:38 PM
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So I did a mathematical exercise to determine the IDEAL inter-bolt distance for a 120' pitch, where ideal was defined as minimizing the impact force. I needed to put Rocknice2's condition in there as a lower bound. The answer: First bolt at shoulder level, then evenly spaced bolts to the top of the pitch. Number of bolts = 197. Not counting the anchor.
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Carnage
Dec 30, 2008, 8:39 PM
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gunkiemike wrote: So I did a mathematical exercise to determine the IDEAL inter-bolt distance for a 120' pitch, where ideal was defined as minimizing the impact force. I needed to put Rocknice2's condition in there as a lower bound. The answer: First bolt at shoulder level, then evenly spaced bolts to the top of the pitch. Number of bolts = 197. Not counting the anchor. instead of putting "minimize impact force" make it impact force not greater than X (figure out an acceptable X) and if possible make some "and make sure you cant deck" condition. Just thinking about it, it seems bolts get farther apart as you go up. basically you would place a bolt every time the FF = .3 for example. So as you get up higher, there is more rope out, so you can go farther between bolts before the FF gets up to that value. in reality, i like when routes dont have decking potential, but still get some distance between the bolts to get you thinking about it. i'm gonna go ahead and say 2-3 meters between bolts. i've heard inside of 10x the bolt diameter can reduce strength. so if you have 2 meters, thats more than enough for each bolt to be full strength. the 1st and second bolts are different tho. just bolt it so a blown second clip wont lead to decking. sometimes this applies to the 3rd bolt too. also, i get pissed when clipping is the crux of the climb. dont put bolts mid crux. also, i dont see why ppl bolt easy intros to climbs. like a climb at a local crag is 11b, there isnt a bolt for like, 20-30 feet because that climbing is like, 5.6. Since theres such a huge difference, anyone who is thinking about an 11b climb shouldnt be worried about climbing 20 feet of 5.6. i dont agree with the stone mountain guys who apply this theory when the climb is rated 5.9, so they dont bolt the 5.8 sections cause they are easy. That shit still scares me poopless. also dont put bolts in shitty rock, i feel like that should go without saying, but you know, some people are dumb (not assuming anything about you, just saying it for others who might read) sorry for the rant, this is just what i've noticed from a few years of climbing. go ahead and disagree with me if you want to. note:as for trad climbing... i climb in NC, i place pro whenever the rock lets me.
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iching
Jan 23, 2009, 7:48 AM
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I like to use the "Golden Mean" to calculate a more aesthetic placement of bolts which results in a very pleasing line. To calculate the perfect mathematical placement divide the length of your pitch (meters) by the Fibonacci phi (e=1.618033989) and then divide this number by the number of placements you expect to make. EXAMPLE Given: your pitch will be 60 meters and you expect to make 10 placements. Therefore: the most pleasing placements would be spaced 12.17 feet apart. Calculation: [(60m/e)/10]= 3.708m or 12.17 feet I've found the quickest and most accurate means of measuring my placements to the last .17 has been to use a small laser range finder.
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pendereki
Jan 23, 2009, 12:27 PM
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A better use of Fibonacci series would be to place the first bolt at 1m, then at 2,, then 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34 meters--as measured from the ground up. This produces a very ascetic, artistic spacing. CM
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Guran
Jan 23, 2009, 1:08 PM
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The ideal bolt spacing is one that is not too runout for me, but scares my (climbing) partner shitless.
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Carnage
Jan 23, 2009, 6:54 PM
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iching wrote: I like to use the "Golden Mean" to calculate a more aesthetic placement of bolts which results in a very pleasing line. To calculate the perfect mathematical placement divide the length of your pitch (meters) by the Fibonacci phi (e=1.618033989) and then divide this number by the number of placements you expect to make. EXAMPLE Given: your pitch will be 60 meters and you expect to make 10 placements. Therefore: the most pleasing placements would be spaced 12.17 feet apart. Calculation: [(60m/e)/10]= 3.708m or 12.17 feet I've found the quickest and most accurate means of measuring my placements to the last .17 has been to use a small laser range finder. so i guess you could be using e as just some random letter to represent a number, but usually when you use e you are almost always talking about the "number e" as in euler's number which is approximately equal to 2.718... the number you are talking about (phi - ϕ) "the golden ratio" is called phi because it is typically represented by the greek letter phi (makes sense doesnt it?) your forumla is however, kinda stupid(and i know, this post is actually an attempt to make fun of math people. me being and engineer, i cannot let this kind of crime against mathematics go uncorrected). It seems like you just wanted to throw some mathematical number in your made up formula. so you picked the first two you knew (e and ϕ) mixed em together and posted some gibberish. i do think that ϕ could help you space bolts appropriately though. what you could do is pick some distance for the first bolt (this could be based on the difficulty of the first bit of climbing, or how spread out you want the bolts... blah, blah blah) then place a bolt. to figure out how far up the next bolt should be, just measure your height from the ground, and multiply that number by ϕ. when you get to the second bolt, again measure your height from the ground, multiply it by ϕ. third bolt..... so you can see the recursiveness that is what ϕ and the Fibonacci series (the two are very closely related) is all about. what is kinda cool about this, is it gives you a constant fall factor, no matter how high the first bolt is. The formula is (fall factor)=(-2+2ϕ)/ϕ when you plug and chug, you'll find that this gives a fall factor of .7639, which (according to petzl fall simulator on a straigh rope path 10.5mm rope and gri gri) gave me an impact force on the top peice of about 9.3kN. which in my book is unacceptable(for bolts its fine, but trad gear is only rated around 10kN sometimes, some of the smaller gear even less!) so lets look at that fall factor formula again.... if we solve for ϕ, but for what were gonna do, we want to change ϕ to something else.... like x, so we dont confuse people. so we will solve for x and it will give us an equation that is a function of fall factor. So we can pick a fall factor and this will give us the x value that we need to use to make sure we have that constant fall factor. x=-2/(FF-2) so we want a FF of 1/3. This give us an x value of 1.2. so for example, our first bolt is 10 meters up, our next would be 10*1.2=12 meters up, our next would be 12*1.2=14.4 meters up. next is 14.4*1.2=17.28 meters up. Lets check the fall factor here... petzl says .33333... haha success! so, real world, this is kinda useless... you're prob gonna place bolts based on more than just how far above your last one you are but in closing.... USE YOUR FUCKING CONSTANTS CORRECTLY SO I DONT HAVE TO TYPE LONG POSTS CALLING YOU A NOOB
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iching
Feb 1, 2009, 9:48 PM
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Just the fact that this question even got a serious responds shows the annal ludicrousy of some climbers who would probably do better finding another sport.
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