In reply to Stevie989:
> How much of the route is bolted?>
A prevailing ethic in Yosemite - an arena in which bolts have played a substantial part for decades - is that subsequent ascents, in whatever style, should not increase the bolt count. This has, of course, been modified over the years; time was when bolts were only placed at belays if natural anchors were inadequate or absent, whereas nowadays multiple and very sturdy bolts are more-or-less the default scenario at the majority of belays on most remotely popular routes. This is in opposition to those who believe that on a wall the belays, too, should be "adventurous" - but theirs tends to be a minority view. But leaving aside the belays, it's still considered very much bad form - or whatever that is in American - to get the drill out in the course of a pitch if you're not doing the FA or the rock hasn't in some way altered since somebody else did. But people are sometimes weak, and climbers are people, so there are are many instances - often very specific and subject to ridicule - in which the "rules" have been bent; the results are generally known, for obvious reasons, as "chicken bolts". Of course, all this tended to apply mostly to aid climbing; such extra bolts would appear where somebody's aid skills were insufficient to make a particularly tricky placement stick, or where their nerve cracked during the course of a section of hooks or expanding nailing. The point to remember, though, is that the ethic also still applies when free-climbing an aid route; unlike in some parts of the UK, where bolted free routes have replaced largely or completely boltless old aid routes, in Yosemite such an outcome wouldn't generally be regarded as an improvement in style. It's likely, therefore, that people attempting free ascents on El Cap and similar will go to considerable lengths to avoid adding bolts to the pitches that they are working on, and I'm unaware of any reason to think that Caldwell might be any different in this respect.
On something as big as a wall, of course, it would be unusual to find a viable free route that exactly followed an existing aid route throughout its whole length; free versions of walls tend to involve substantial variations onto more practicable free-climbing terrain, including, as in this case, onto quite separate routes. Such departures from the original line often involve completely new sections of climbing on which it is up to the climber involved, as with any first ascentionist, whether and how to equip the new climbing with fixed/drilled gear. As these new links often follow discreet lines of usable holds, rather than the more obvious features of interest to the original aid-climbers, they tend to be on blankish rock and can hence require bolts for protection, or nothing. At least three such link pitches are to found on the "Free Dawn Wall", two of which appear to constitute most of the crux.
These two topos should give an idea of the number of bolts on the existing pitches that the free route uses; x = bolt/"drilled placement".
http://yosemitebigwall.com/mescalito
http://yosemitebigwall.com/wall-early-morning-light
It follows the first five pitches of Mescalito; three on Adrift; link traverse (new) back into Mescalito pitch 9; pitches 10, 11, 12 of Mescalito; two link traverse pitches (new) leftwards into Wall of Early Morning Light - arriving (I think) somewhere near or just below the point at which New Dawn arrives from the other direction; five pitches (the first being the "dyno-pitch") following WoEML to a pitch above Wino Tower (with the possible exception of one which might be on Reticent); a short link up and round onto the ledge atop Mescalito's Bismark (the two routes are very close at this point); whereafter it follows the next four and-a-half pitches of Mescalito before traversing right and climbing up to finish either on or just right of Mescalito's final pitch (probably the latter). It should be remembered that some or many of the "bolts", particularly those on the ladders on the WoEML pitches, are likely to be of an ancient and spindly variety such as an aid-climber might gently ease his weight onto, rather than the sort of Petzl-branded product onto which one might cheerfully take successive and increasing lobs during the course of a redpoint project!
Hope this is of some vague help and interest.