The bolt which failed at Kleinmond due to Stress Corrosion Cracking - Click to enlarge
Hi all,
Just to let you know that another bolt has failed at Kleinmond. Allan Hills took a whipper on Perculator which resulted in the crux bolt breaking.
I have looked at the bolt and it is very clearly Stress Corrosion Cracking (SCC) that caused the failure.
Very little of the cross sectional area was left as a result of the SCC. Please treat all express anchors at coastal crags and Oudtshoorn with caution.
Regards,
Andy Davies
For MCSA Anchor Replacement Fund
Here is a summary of all the anchor failures:
| Where | Route | Comment | |
| The Alley – Montagu | Unknown | Lower off chains | 1 |
| The Steeple – Montagu | Quassimodo | Loosening hanger | 1 |
| Silvermine Main | Sterling Silver | Toprope | 1 |
| Kleinmond | Zuchini | Leader fall | 1 |
| Kalkbay | Project | Chopping process | 1 |
| Kalkbay | Project | Chopping process | 1 |
| Mine – Silvermine | Red guitar | Chopping process | 1 |
| Mine – Silvermine | Gift of wings | Toprope rebolt | 1 |
| Mine – Silvermine | Too pumped | Clipping | 1 |
| Mine – Silvermine | Swan Lake | Chopping process | 1 |
| Oudtshoorn | Seven | Tightening hanger | 1 |
| Hole – Muizenberg | Mystique Voyer | Leader fall – injury? | 1 |
| Hole – Muizenberg | Joe’s route | Leader fall | 1 |
| Kleinmond | Perculator | Leader fall | 1 |
| Total | 14 |
Do we know of any bolt failures outside of Western Cape? Perhaps some distant routes in Coffee Bay ancient routes in Magalies or something? Capies running the risk of being called bad bolters! LOL
I assume that some of those 600 glue in bolts will be heading to Kleinmond?
Thanks for posting
mmmmm, time for a bolting meet at kleinmond?
Mr Hills. You Beast! Hope no injuries?
Thankfully no injuries, just a bit of an eye opener. My belayer actually got the worst of it because he suffered some pretty bad ropeburn.
The winger wasn’t even all that big, I only fell from a foot or two above the bolt when it failed. I suppose the unexpected part of the fall did leave me less than 2m or so off the deck so you could call it a winger.
We put a lot of faith and trust into equipment that we don’t know too much about and I for one had definitely become very complacent with regards to the trust I placed in fixed pro.
I realised that if we want to safely keep climbing routes for years to come, we are going to have to maintain the fixed protection on those routes. If not, we can watch sport climbing suffer a slow and painful death (with us climbers feeling most of the pain). I enjoy sport climbing so don’t want to see that happen. As a community, we have to keep our playgrounds safe because no one will be doing it for us. I think I’ll definitely be giving the good guys and girls of the ARF a helping hand in future.
Alan does this mean you will organise the next ARF meet at Kleinmond?
Sure, why not. Unless it takes someone who knows something about bolting routes. If I were to take the drill and get trigger happy at this stage, none of the routes would be safe and Kleinmond would have a few more pockets than it used to. You have my number, give me a call.