Bolt Fund Proliferation

[Anonymous]

Well safely back after my 14th trip to Kalymnos and another 2 weeks of brilliant climbing and new routing.

While I was there I did notice a few bars and restaurants with collection boxes marked “bolt fund” and I was wondering how this is administered and money accounted for?

The two main funds, Glaros Bar administred by Steve and Sue Macdonald who supply equipper such as myself, Claude & Yve, Gaz P etc and Kalymnos Adventure Centre admined by Birgitte and Bridgette who supply Aris with gear for maintenence.

So what about these new collection points, which of the above funds benefit from the money they raise??

Does the money go for maintenence of routes?

Does the money go towards new routes?

I would be very interested to find out as any public donations should be able to be accounted for.

[Anonymous]

Hi Andy,

First of all, thank you for being a faithful friend of Kalymnos. When is trip #15?

About the assorted bolt funds of Kalymnos:

Climb Kalymnos is NOT affiliated with any of these bolt funds, so we don’t know where the collected donations end up. Each owner of every cafe or shop with a collection box should (hopefully) be able to account for the money they collect. Surely some of them do.

We can only answer how we, Climb Kalymnos, get our bolts, and what we do with them.

How we get our bolts:

With proceeds from the sales of the Kalymnos guidebook. Since the publication of the last edition of the guidebook, we have spent roughly 5.000 EUR per year on bolts, hangers and lower-offs for what we call the “Climb Kalymnos Bolting/Rebolting Supply”. All purchases and amounts are documented by invoice. We do not ask for donations (though we have received a handful of them by climbers who reached out to us, for which we are grateful), and we do not have a collection box anywhere in Kalymnos.

What we do with our bolts:

We use the vast majority of our bolts for route maintenance. A very small portion of our bolt supply is used for new routing. Maintenance is done by a few climbers on a voluntary basis, and we also happily supply bolts to visiting climbers/equippers, such as yourself, willing to do some of the ‘dirty work’ of rebolting in addition to (or instead of) bolting new routes.

More details about the specifications of the bolts we buy are listed here: http://climbkalymnos.com/climbing/#anchor

Coming back to the accountability issue, *ideally* the new municipality will become involved in -somewhat- regulating the island’s climbing and route maintenance, and in distributing public donations with full accountability, as you said. Fingers crossed.

[Anonymous]

Interesting.

Trip 15 We will be back on October 15th – 29th for more fun in the sun hanging off rocks and drilling some holes

If yourselves and Mr Macdonald don’t see any of the funds collected from these boxes may I possibly hazard a guess they are perhaps a fraudulent way of raising monies for the establishments proprietors?

We would be most glad to help with rebolting an old route and helping with maintenance but this beggars yet another question are we going to replace like for like ie expansion bolts or is it high time we make the transition to resin in

bolts ?

[Anonymous]

Glue in, (resin) bolts it is not the answer as no company gives guaranty for the glue more than three (3)! years. (Even HILTI).

We, the Climb Kalymnos supply of bolts, use for rebolting custom-made KINOBI bolts by AustriAlpin and it is 316L stainless-steel, 12mm.

Here you can read the latest info and research about the bolts: http://www.climbing.com/climber/built-to-last/

The UIAA are writing the standards for corrosion-resistance in fixed climbing protection. There will be Class 1, 2, 3 and 4. What we’re looking to achieve is a minimum lifespan before rebolting is required (this will vary based on rock type, climate, usage, etc).

[Anonymous]

http://www.boltproducts.com company run by Jim Tit really helpful and very knowledgeblere bolting.

Thailand, renound for corroding bolts are replacing all their expansions bolts with titanium resin in bolts

http://www.thaitaniumproject.com is interesting to visit and pretty informative.

Quite a few of us equippers and climbers feel strongly that glue ins are the way forward for rebolting routes if not we are going to end up with unsightly routes with lots of holes. Resin bolts as you know use the same hole everytime its replaced.

Surely we should at least have a trial with a few routes ??

[Anonymous]

“Resin bolts as you know use the same hole everytime its replaced.”

It is only in theory …

In reality it is impossible to recover the rings by heating the metal! I tried … this is only possible in a workshop but impossible on a rope, in the cliff!

And i agree with Aris … we don’t know anythings about the problems of infiltration of water between the resin and the limestone after many years! In France I already have rings that move (and had to be replaced) after 15 years! The solution was to break them with a rotation … and then drill a new hole on side! The same that with expansions bolts

[Anonymous]

http://www.bolt-products.com

look at the article on Sustainable Bolting.

Replacing like for like through bolts is a rather short term view

we will eventually run out of viable placements on the rock.

Im not trying to be awkward or inflamatory but we should think of how

best to manage our finite resource we all love, the rock.

[Anonymous]

Dear Friends,

I am one of the suppliers of Aris. Actually, he was wrong, he bought WAY MORE than what he claimed. Unfortunately, I can name dozens of guidebook authors, that claims they supply gear, but in reality the invoices they can show are a very minimal part of what you can expect. Aris is a very good exception.

A few extra explanations:

-Aris bought a lot of gear for Kaly. A lot of this gear is 316L, a part was 304L. I used to supply him with gear I bought from another notable supplier, but I was not super happy of the results. So I sold to Aris (since I came to Kaly at date 5 times) some bolts with the price of 304, but I supplied 316L.

– Some other “locals” bought significant quantity of gear. Including a shop, that as far as I know, “charity” the bolts.

At today, I was not contacted by any other bolt-found active on Kalymnos for a quote to supply gear. This does NOT mean, nor I want to point the finger to anybody, that they use the money they collect for other purposes; I am obviously NOT the only supplier in the world!

In general, anybody that collect money for bolts, should have invoices on how they spend the money. It’s a matter of honesty.

I Skip any discussion on glue ins and material of gear.

Ciao,

Emanuele

[Anonymous]

In September 2014, I will be undertaking the rebolting of a route of mine, Spartan Wall. It was bolted with 10mm expansion bolts which I understand are now in a very poor condition. I intend to remove the old bolts and place twisted leg anchors in the holes. I will be using either polyester or vinylester resin and I have every confidence that this is the way forward.

Clearly, we cannot keep drilling holes 200mm away from other holes for placing expansion bolts each time a bolt needs ‘replacing’ because there are limited number of places where one might want to have a bolt.

I do not follow the argument that the reason to avoid resin bolts in the lack of guarantee – what guarantees are given by the suppliers of expansion bolts? I would not mistake the lack of guarantee for a suggestion that the resin will not last. Why would a manufacturer give a guarantee when people are already using the product in enormous numbers without any problems?

As regards removing old glue-in bolts by heating (see above): What? Why would you do that when you can just drill holes to the side of the bolt and knock it out – then fill the holes in (and yes I have done this and it works perfectly well.)

Could it be that using resin bolts is just a lot more effort? Do the routes in Kalymnos not deserve the best of care?

I will leave you with this from Jim Titt’e website – I am not linked to Jim’s business in any way, I just use his products because I think he know more about this subject than anyone else:

“The general consensus seems to be that glued-in bolts have an almost indefinite life span. The D.A.V. tested some older bolts (up to 15yrs) and found no loss in strength.

The glues themselves when cured are chemically inert and should not degrade though some weakening from water has been observed with polyester. Additionally they often contain cement powder as a filler which provides an additional long term fixing. The glues used in the construction industry have an expected life span of at least 20yrs and the European standard for chemical anchors gives a life of 50 years as a reference point for designers.”

[Anonymous]

Dear Adrian,

I think you are making a bit of confusion.

You are mixing the issue of “material” with the issue of how the material is placed in the rock.

Material: from which alloy the material is made. Either a bolt, or a glue in, if made from the same material, will show about the same issues with the general term of “corrosion”. So do no expect if you use 304, 316, zinc plated any kind of difference between bolts and glue ins. Sure, there are some better “materials”.

Bolts and glue-ins are offered in different materials.

If you buy bolts, yes, finding hangers in different materials can be difficult. You find they in 304, 316 and I do not know if Titts make anything “more resistant” to “corrosion.

Glue ins: you can find something from Titt made from materials that are supposed to resist corrosion better. In Sardinia given the smaller diameter of the rod, they found it “cuts” the resin, but I think these are discussion that starts at loads we will never achieve in the “real world”. I have no detailed info about that.

Bolts: there are some bolts made from 1.4529 (HRC) from Hilti and a handfull of other reliable brands, that have a much better resistant to corrosion than ANY other glue ins available in the market

Most bolts producers are big companies that share liability for what they do. Some has certain certifications used for “working” business. No “climbing gear” equipment is a “big” company that have to share the burden of certifications (read it as “liability”).

Glue: no glue supplier wants to deal with climbers, Because climbers has a very “everything goes” attitude, to write it down very simply. It’s also a matter of cost. Every glue you buy, has no warranty. So if after a while is become chewing gun, it’s your problem (equipper). I can tale some “problems” we faced with some glues of Hilti for example (just to name a very reliable company), that came out after 10 years (ten years) the glue was placed. I can tale you some things happened to my with 878 chartrides from Mungo (from CH)…

If everything goes ok, “glue ins” are the better choice for bolting. However, I have no clue if you have ever glued in a route (may be overhanging) and you’ll deal with a great misery. Try.

It takes about 3 folds the time of bolting (or re bolting).

All other issues than removing glue ins, etc, etc, etc, are about the same systems you can use to remove a bolt. So where’s the difference?

The 50 years that Titt is writing you about is exactly what the industrial (bolts) certification says. As I said, you are confusing the issues of “materials” and how they are placed in the rock. There are photos of glueins coming out for problems with the glue, and by corrosion, easily available in the web. Remind that if you place glue ins next to “tufas” you may consider “though some weakening from water has been observed with polyester”.

Finally: I am a climber, I am a equipper and I sell gear. I try to keep in mind the 3 things I mentioned you.

I can tell my opinion.

Dealing with glueins, is a difficult task. It’s a very slow procedure if you want to do it properly. Particularly if the rock is often overhanging (Kalymnos). In rebolting with glue ins, you should consider a labour cost of about 3, to four times, longer. Few people has the skills and attitude to do it “properly”. Were some people starting to glueins, I will have my hairs go electric for the damage they may cause!

Dealing with bolts is faster, and the cases of bad bolts placed are “much lower”.

Given the facts, I discourage the use of glueins. The chance to make it badly, it’s MUCH higher, and the hassle to remove a glue in, try… I can also show you in Kalymnos some photos of poorly made glue ins, drilled too deep in the rock.

If people care about the rock, I instead suggest to bolt 12/100 mm HRC bolts (which, by the way, I do not sell) bought from the very handfull number of industrial supplies, and use a 12 mm 316/A4 hanger that one day, somebody will replace (only the hanger). This is probably the best +50 years solution. You should consider about 9/12 euro each point.

I am in Kalymnos 14-21 October if you want to share a beer. Of you can contact your fellow brit Alan Jarvis of UIAA technical team for further informaton.

Finally a very simple observation. Before removing any old bolts, I will test them some of them. There are some machines made to pull out bolts that it’s worth considering.

Best,

E

[Author]

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