[shark]

Is it a better or worse testpiece with that hold though??

The whole idea of a testpiece is that it is a benchmark / measure so change isn’t desirable in that respect. Whether it is a better or worse problem with the bigger hold is another question.

[tomtom]

The whole idea of a testpiece is that it is a benchmark / measure so change isn’t desirable in that respect.

Peak lime ain't the best for that then.... like making a ruler out of bread...

[Will Hunt]

Does it not just become a benchmark 7A+ (or whatever) testpiece? I'm sure there are other 7B testpieces out there. 


Caveat: I've never been to The Snore and have no strong feeling about what happens here.

[petejh]

A foothold on Rockatrocity came off a few weeks ago. Perhaps this is an opportunity for an anglo-welsh limestone cultural exchange - the Weedkiller handhold could be donated to the cave guardians to be reattached on RA and the Rockatrocity foothold given in gift to the peak Torlords be glued back on Weedkiller.

[r-man]

Is it a better or worse testpiece with that hold though??

The whole idea of a testpiece is that it is a benchmark / measure so change isn’t desirable in that respect. Whether it is a better or worse problem with the bigger hold is another question.

Weedkiller a benchmark? It used to be 7A+. Then got upgraded to 7B. Surely much easier than most lime 7Bs? Don't think it can be a benchmark.

On testpieces... There are couple of possible meaning origins for testpiece. Either a piece of music performed by contestants in a competition, or a piece of material used to gauge its properties.

The latter fits the idea of a problem determining a certain difficulty level. But the former offers the possibility that a testpiece can just be a notable challenge. I think I prefer that one.

[shark]

A notable challenge made easier can’t be good thing though - can it?

[tomtom]

A notable challenge made easier can’t be good thing though - can it?

You sound like my wife 😂

[kingholmesy]

Caveat: I've never been to The Snore

You’ve not lived. 

[Coops_13]

Caveat: I've never been to The Snore and have no strong feeling about what happens here.

How can you possibly catalogue the unknown stones when you haven’t been to the Known stones!

[tomtom]

Reports that say that something hasn't been climbed are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known stones; there are stones we know we know. We also know there are known unknownstones; that is to say we know there are some stones we do not know. But there are also unknown unknownstones—the stones we don't know we don't know. And if one looks throughout the history of our country and other free countries, it is the latter category that tend to be the difficult ones.

[Will Hunt]

Reports that say that something hasn't been climbed are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known stones; there are stones we know we know. We also know there are known unknownstones; that is to say we know there are some stones we do not know. But there are also unknown unknownstones—the stones we don't know we don't know. And if one looks throughout the history of our country and other free countries, it is the latter category that tend to be the difficult ones.

The familiarity of that gave me a horrible feeling for a moment that I'd actually said it.

[DAVETHOMAS90]

Someone had been there, firtling around. On Peak lime, that's tantamount to chipping.

Apologies for the long post. I was quite happy to leave this topic alone and let folk decide what to do, but since it sounds like I'm being accused of something "tantamount to chipping" maybe I should make myself crystal clear. Frankly, I'm surprised/disappointed that I need to defend myself against someone like Dave who has that much experience of Peak lime and is aware of what the rock can be like.

So, to correct the above quote, no-one was there furtling around. I was there doing something we all do - I was climbing. I was trying a few different options on the move from the wobbly hold to the left hand slot to see if I was missing a better sequence with my feet (I was), got set up for the move to the slot, looked at the slot and then, as I started to move my left, hit the mat. The offending bit of rock was on the mat with me. There were no spotters, no-one else at the crag and no phones set up to video every attempt, so you can either take my word for it or decide you know better.

If the above describes an action "tantamount to chipping" then everyone who's snapped a hold off a route/problem is a chipper and there aren't going to be many Peak/UK sport climbers who can hold their heads up high to Dave's lofty principles (even Dave?). On those grounds, I'm responsible for "chipping" at numerous crags around the country - I can probably provide a list if anyone's interested, it's got nearly every sport lime crag I've been to in the UK on and that's a fair number. I haven't even restricted my "chipping" to sport routes - I even "chipped" some routes at the trad heartlands of Pembroke and Gogarth. So let's get this in perspective, it's not chipping, it's a loose hold that came off. Fill it in or leave it alone, it makes little difference, the problem's covered in glue anyway. However, don't refer to what happened as being "tantamount to chipping" or "definitely excavated", because mud sticks (even after it's brushed off) especially when it's thrown by well-known/well-respected climbers like Dave.

FWIW, I'm in the same camp as Dan when it comes to glueing holds back and filling holds in - it's a massive can of worms. Where the rock is stable and the problem still climbable at broadly the same grade, leave it alone. The crags  are in a continual state of erosion/decay (albeit over a very long timeframe) so we're fighting against a very strong tide if we think we can maintain things in the state similar to our current tiny frame of reference. Some routes/holds are always going to be temporary - does that mean we should try and save everything? If a move is done once without a hold coming off, does that mean it's now a permanent fixture? Where the rock is unstable post-break, I can see arguments for tidying up and where grades change significantly (particularly upwards) I can see some logic, but it's a fine balance. In this case, the hold is stable (probably more so than the rest of the problem), the grade broadly unchanged so leave it be.

As an aside, I can remember a hold being added back to Biological Need at Kilnsey when it went from F7c to F8a about 20 years ago and I'm glad it was because it's a great route, but I'm also glad it wasn't me making the decision because I'm not sure I'd have come to the same conclusion. The details of that decision have been lost in the mists of time, as will any decisions made about Weedkiller. In the case of Biological, the internet echo chamber didn't exist or was used far less, so much less hand-wringing and righteous quotes to be found, but I'd guess it wasn't clear-cut.

Bill Ramsey made an interesting point on chipping in the recent Runout podcast, saying that chipping should be an overall consideration encompassing aesthetics, ethics, etc. (I might be paraphrasing) and that decisions should be made by experienced route developers. I think similarly here - does a UKB poll give you the right answer? Does everyone voting have all the information? Has everyone been engaged? Neil Gresham found the sharp end of such internet polls when he bolted the start of Deja Vu (I think) a few years back. However the decision gets made, I hope people think about the aesthetics (hard at Raven Tor, I know!), the overall problem and the reason why they're filling or not filling the hold, rather than some knee jerk reaction to a small nubbin of rock going missing.

Stabbsy, what's this "defending myself from someone like Dave" rubbish? 

I went on what I'd seen, and what it looked like - in the absence of any other info.

It's reassuring to get the low down from you about what did happen. If you've posted info anywhere else, I wasn't aware of it. So, no reference to you there 

I've seen plenty of holds scraped out before - as we all have, and it looked as though some of the other rock there had seen some attention too.

I think the flake could do with pinning pre-emptively.

[tomtom]

Assumption is the mother of all fuck ups

[DAVETHOMAS90]

Assumption is the mother of all fuck ups

It's hardly a fuck up TT.

We all make guesses, all the time, and mine wasn't unreasonable.

The word "enlarged" could mean many things - rather than "broken".

 FWIW I think that if I'd read Stabbsy's post on another thread, I wouldn't have been likely to suggest that "someone had been firtling around". 

I'd still support filling it.

[shark]

No one’s like Dave

[NaoB]

A solution to please all involved: find a suitable size rock and attach a little handle to the front. Then it can be inserted or removed depending on the climbers preference. Hey presto!

[Moo]

I'm gonna smash the whole problem to pieces with a sledgehammer and give you guys something to really talk about.

[moose]

Weedkiller a benchmark? It used to be 7A+. Then got upgraded to 7B. Surely much easier than most lime 7Bs? Don't think it can be a benchmark.

On testpieces... There are couple of possible meaning origins for testpiece. Either a piece of music performed by contestants in a competition, or a piece of material used to gauge its properties.

The latter fits the idea of a problem determining a certain difficulty level. But the former offers the possibility that a testpiece can just be a notable challenge. I think I prefer that one.

Perhaps "rite of passage" is more apt - with its implications of a faintly unpleasant experience that's sold to each new generation as "character building".