UKC

I was looking at adding a few holds to my local wall for some winter training:

Has anyone got any experience of these from TCA?
http://www.tcaclimbingshop.com/Default.aspx?LoadContent=StoreIceHolds&S...

Or are we better off just sticking some carpet behind our existing holds and hooking?

In reply to Reach>Talent:
Oh incase it makes any difference to the replies; the wall is vertical and about 7m high.

In reply to Reach>Talent:
Bump

In reply to Reach>Talent:
blackpool towers had a 'tooling comp a few weeks ago and I was there while they were preping the routes. it looked like they were setting routes with these 'ice-holds' but can't be sure. Bet if you keep bumping this thread someone who competed in the comp will pop up...
<either that or attempt an email to the towers HQ, council run though so don't expect too much from them!>

In reply to Reach>Talent: A few years ago my company Wagerholds sponsored/supplied all the holds for a dry-tooling comp at Glasgow climbing centre.The holds that were used came from across all our ranges,
and during all of the comp only one hold broke.
Bits of carpet was put behind the holds to protect the wall.
A good idea is to keep tooling holds apart from normal use holds as bits are sometimes chipped off with the picks.
Tim

In reply to Reach>Talent:

The Ice Factor has trialed the Ice Holds and found them fairly hopeless. The material is very dense, so you need scalpel-sharp picks and a forceful, stabbing swing to make them stick. Hooking doesnt really happen, as the features arent deep enough or shaped enough; cant see anyone ever cutting loose on them!

I'd just go with the old holds and carpet approach, but do be aware that the holds wont be much use for anything else after!

In reply to Reach>Talent:

Pinnacle Climbing Centre in Northampton had an evening of dry tooling which was awesome fun

There are some pictures on their web site and you can see how they set the holds on to plywood. They also made some special jamming hooking holds from plywood.
Another thing they did was to hang some drilled wooden blocks from the overhangs to make things a little more interesting.
One point to note though is that that used older holds and set totally different routes for the evening

Have a look at the pictures here http://www.thepinnaclecentre.co.uk/album.php?album=events_courses_and_facil...

(I hope that works !)

The evening went so well they're doing a whole weekend of it in November, can't remember the dates tho. Great workout before the real stuff arrives.

Be good,

W

In reply to Jamie Bankhead:
Cheers Jamie, that was sort of what I expected.

In terms of hold selection, is there any benefit to using larger holds? I was thinking of keeping the tooling holds as mostly small positive screw-ons to keep the cost down.

Also when setting problems that require stein pulls and the like are there any holds to avoid as we don't want too many shattering under the strain!

In reply to Reach>Talent: In my limited experience, larger holds are - perhaps obviously - more forgiving than smaller ones, better for either really steep sections or beginners, or as a rest in a harder section. The stein pulls I've seen are on pretty big jugs, I guess they are more secure placements - it could be a bit dicey having your pick pop out at full force on a stein pull. The holds can take it, I've seen bits chipped or shaved off but no shattering... yet

In reply to iksander: PS. which wall are you talking about? Calshot?

In reply to blanchie14c:

I was at the blackpool comp. They just had standard climbing holds, non of the ice things.

I would stick to the carpet method and use the money saved to replace any holds that get knackered by the end of the winter (which I reckon will be not as many as you think).

Also, why not use some small logs (or big ones) to add a bit of dimension to the routes, you can either drill holes into the logs for placing axes or if its a bigger log you can swing your axes into them.

You'll get the idea if you have a look at my photo gallery as there are a couple of tooling comp photos in there.

hope thats helpful.

In reply to iksander:

No, this is at a small private wall in Hertfordshire.

In reply to tom290483:
How did you do in the comp? I'm bobbing down for a go next week

In reply to blanchie14c:

yeah it was good comp. some inventive routes set by Pete Hill and team.

i would suggest giving them a call before you head down as they wont let you swing your axes around of there are groups there or anything. having said that the place is usually empty and they left out spare logs/tyres which would could fix onto the wall ourselves when we got there. take a rope and some clips so you can aid up the wall and drag up them up behind you.

In reply to Reach>Talent: I set drytooling routes and find the use of carpets the best option to date. To further prevent holds from spinning,try cutting around the hold when placing carpet behind hold. Hope this helps

In reply to Reach>Talent:

I've also seen some places use squares of lino or vinyl flooring behind instead of carpet. Don't know if they'd be more prone to spinning though...

In reply to Reach>Talent:

The original samples of Ice Holds that came to the UK did leave much to be desired. However over the past few years they have evolved and underdone many improvements in both the compound mix and the shaping.
All we can say is that until you use them you just won't believe how good they are. Ice and drytool aficionado Tim Emmet has been using them in Bristol and you can see the results on our blog.

http://www.theclimbingacademy.com/blog

We'll be producing a top tips video to go with it soon.

In reply to Reach>Talent:

Hello Mike, since many people are interested in trying these holds we have decided to offer a 'try before you buy' scheme where you are able to have a 2 week trial.

Simply order a hold from this range
http://www.tcaclimbingshop.com/Default.aspx?LoadContent=CatSplats-amp;Blobs... email us on shop@theclimbingacademy.com to say that you wish to try an ice hold, and we will send you one of our demo holds.

Once the hold is returned we will issue you with a refund against the cost of the ice hold.

Here's the video of them being used :-

vimeo.com/16669161

In reply to tom290483: They kept that comp quiet, id have been up for that if id known. Is dry tooling standard there now?