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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Jul 24, 2010 - 12:12pm PT
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The details are everything! Thanks again. Great review by Geoff Birtles, no less! Did you ever see any Cog prototypes before they worked out the shape of the final extrusions?
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nutstory
climber
Ajaccio, Corsica, France.
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Jul 26, 2010 - 04:32am PT
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No Steve, unfortunately, nobody has ever showed me any prototypes of the Clog Cogs, either at the old Clog factory when I visited Denny Moorhouse in 1998 or at the DMM factory in 1996.
And it seems that it will not be an easy affair to complete the early longer set.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Jul 26, 2010 - 10:51am PT
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Any chance that you have a Brass A or Brass B Cog?
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nutstory
climber
Ajaccio, Corsica, France.
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Jul 26, 2010 - 11:03am PT
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Steve, look closely at the chart... The "Cogs" A and B, made of brass, are in fact hexagonal shape; so they are just Clog Hexagons that previously matched the aluminum set...
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Jul 26, 2010 - 11:54am PT
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Even though I have enough balls, I still sometimes hesitate on the moves.
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nutstory
climber
Ajaccio, Corsica, France.
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Jul 26, 2010 - 11:57am PT
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Impressive Marty, really impressive...
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Jul 26, 2010 - 12:02pm PT
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Hmmm, got a spare #4 Lowe/Byrne unit in there...
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Jul 26, 2010 - 02:58pm PT
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Stephane,
What was the purpose of Clog and Troll using Brass for their smaller hexes? Did they fear the aluminum being too soft that it would rip off of the wires in a big fall?
Joseph, no extra #4s sorry. I do have a Lowe/Byrne double ball nut like Malcolm shows earlier on this thread. It creates the same offset range of placement that the Middendorf Monkey Paw provided. I am surprised that the double ball was not distributed.
Rock on! Marty
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nutstory
climber
Ajaccio, Corsica, France.
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Jul 27, 2010 - 03:15am PT
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You are right Marty. Even today the micro nuts are not made of aluminum alloy.
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duncan
climber
London, UK
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Jul 27, 2010 - 03:29pm PT
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Very nice Bob Godfrey film about the evolution of nuts showing an ascent of Dinas Cromlech's Left Wall.
part 1
part 2
The YouTube caption suggests the climbing was filmed in 1964 (The registration number in the second film dates the Mini to 1964 but what climber runs a new car?) although the film was made in 1976 and the narration and gear at the start and finish are clearly from the '70s.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Jul 27, 2010 - 08:15pm PT
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Ed Hartouni found me a copy of that film on VHS format. The fact that some clever fellow climbed that wall with a pocket full of stones goes beyond poetry...
Total classic and one that Stephane was looking for not long ago.
And all for the lack of a nail!
Very cool ads!
Those tiny brass hexes always seemed doomed if you fell on one!
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Chouinard used to use a long fall (25' if memory serves) held by the Brass A as evidence that nuts actually worked!
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Rowl
Trad climber
Spain. Finestrat
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Back in the early sixties Denny Moorhouse came to my old welsh farm in Clwt-y-Bont ( close to Llanberis) to ask if he could use one of the barns to use for a store and work shop.
He had just bought a mechanical hack saw, on Exhange and Mart, to start making climbing gear. He needed a place to start up in and store machinery
It was also at this time that he met Shirley Smith who was also to play a major role in the development of Glog climbing gear.
I had at the time a small A35 Austin Van which we used to bring this first piece of gear up to the farm( really only a small holding). He had also order some more equipement which again I used the van to bring it to Clwt-y-Bont. The wieught of this gear was so great the back of the van was nearly touching the floor.
Denny made his first Hex nut in the barn soon after , threaded at that time with rope.
He stay with us for some time and later aquired the old cinema in Deniolen where he started Glog climbing gear in ernest. I still have that original nut which served me well for many years finally being religated to the history box.
Dmm as it is now started from such small beginnings. Dennys contribution to clean climbing was enormous. As Dmm is to-day.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Thanks for the outstanding history slice, Rowland! Any chance that you could post a snapshot of DM's first nut! Any shots of those early days would be greatly appreciated.
Did you ever fiddle with nut designs yourself?
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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The decision to leave the hammers behind in the early seventies left clean climbers with a quandry...testing the abundant fixed pitons. One clever solution came from the Lowe-Camp crew. The weighted nut tool!
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michaelc
Trad climber
Sydney Oz
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Oct 26, 2010 - 08:55am PT
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Hey, blast from the past, I recall going to the Clog factory to buy seconds from Denny Moorehouse
Lovely silver krabs in big rumbling polishing machines up in the Deineolen factory
But there was nothing like slotting in a MOAC above your head. We used to string them with 9mm and then wrap the rope below the nut in 9mm insulation tape to make them easy to place above your head!
Then you bought a second one and filed it down a few 1/10ths on an inch to make it that bit smaller
After a while we used to get a round file and put a long wide groove down the nut to make it sit that bit sweeter
Once a couple of those mamas were in place it was time to pull out the roll up tobacco and introduce some relaxing drugs into the sport
M
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LongAgo
Trad climber
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Oct 26, 2010 - 06:44pm PT
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Duncan,
The two videos you give are priceless, taking me back to my own early 60s trip to the exact area filmed with partner Ivan Couch. I remember an old fellow with long beard and wool top to bottom (name buried in musty diary somewhere) saw us looking over the cliffs and said right off - NO PITONS. Well, we didn't have any. In fact we had no ropes or hardware, only climbing shoes of the day thinking we might boulder here and there on our trip through U.K and Europe, but we fell in love with the pass area pictured and wanted to climb something, somehow, in spite of the drizzle and gray. He had heard of Americans hanging on walls with pins and slings and said the limited cliffs would go to hell with piton scars, so, well, here if you must, and handed us a rack of the very machine nuts pictured and pointed us to several climbs (Brant's to start) then the big C Corner to the right of the face pictured and off we went. I was amazed how well the nuts worked and wrote about them in an early Summit article. Royal took note (as then editor of Summit) and it was not long before he made a U.K. tour and saw for himself the potential of nuts.
I don’t know exactly how all these experiences and other hardware and climbing info tid bits went back and forth between Brits and Americans in the mid and late 60’s (Brits made visits to Yosemite in that time). But it was not long before nut technology went from machine nuts to the real thing, and on from there.
I still don’t get the magic of misty black and gray walls half clouded, and damp shoe soles and warm brew at the end of a scary day, but all did grab me and I made several more climbing trips to land and sea cliffs there and treasure the memories. Thanks for the time warp links.
Tom Higgins
LongAgo
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throwpie
Trad climber
Berkeley
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Oct 26, 2010 - 07:45pm PT
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Sorry, I couldn't resist. Those little stoppers were quite versatile...
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charlie.elverson
Trad climber
St. Paul, MN
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Oct 26, 2010 - 08:37pm PT
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Were nuts accepted more easily for aid climbing than free climbing? My thinking behind this question is that for aid you could place a few then a pin and feel pretty safe and move faster.
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michaelc
Trad climber
Sydney Oz
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Oct 28, 2010 - 06:59am PT
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Another post..... Ref the development of nuts:
My understanding is that prior to nuts rounded pebbles were placed in cracks and then slings looped around for protection
The centre piece of the Llanberis Pass is Centotaph Corner on Dinas Cromlech, climbed by Joe Brown
Myth has it that there is a fairly large pebble from the river below jammed in the corner called The Pudding Stone that has migrated itself up and down the climb over the years
Detail can be found in Rock Climbing in Snowdonia By Paul Williams on Page 175
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