torching? How about brushing?

[Tyrone Brett]

Okay, all this talk about adverse effects on rock has got me thinking. Torch: maybe... maybe.... a few hard core locals. Brushes: hundreds if not thousands of visitors each year, with thousands upon thousands of brush strokes every season. Effect or no effect?
Tyrone
adendum: what has created the polished crystals on Easy and Superfly: hands, brushes, coarse chalk...?

[Brendan]

there's gotta be some sort of damage to the rock. if not now, then in the future!? i wonder how much damage nylon bristle brushes do? someone should do a test on a non-important piece of squamish granite, where they do thousands of strokes and wait for the results!!

[Mike C.]

my guess is that its a combination of frequent brushing, chalk and human remanent. hence the sometimes yellow cake goodness that shows up at the end of summer on problems like easychair. good thing our winters are so laden with preciptation or else middle eastern countries might try and poach our potentially uranium rich sloping traverses. if its not uranium causing the yellowing then we must ooze genetic material from our skin that corrodes the surface of the granite.

[Dooley]

if its not uranium causing the yellowing then we must ooze genetic material from our skin that corrodes the surface of the granite.

Its the THC leaching through!

[rich k]

Effect or no effect?

effect. but there's no way climbers (myself included) would listen if there was a no-brushing rule in effect.

are there things we can do to minimize impact? yup.
- you could wash holds that have chalk caked-on them with water, or rubbing alcohol to clean them. this works better than a chalk brush anyways.
- you could get a boars hair brush and use it instead. hairs are super soft and would do less damage, plus the brush definitely works better than the more mainstream ones

any other suggestions?

[mcgarnickle]

Effect or no effect?

effect. but there's no way climbers (myself included) would listen if there was a no-brushing rule in effect.

are there things we can do to minimize impact? yup.
- you could wash holds that have chalk caked-on them with water, or rubbing alcohol to clean them. this works better than a chalk brush anyways.
- you could get a boars hair brush and use it instead. hairs are super soft and would do less damage, plus the brush definitely works better than the more mainstream ones

any other suggestions?

Boar's hair brush??? Why don't we use harp seal hair brushes? They are much softer still, definitely won't harm the precious ROCKS. Let's skin some other animals to make brushes for cleaning chalk.
Rubbing alcohol? You're very insensitive to our environment dood, me, I carry Patron platinum instead, I love my environment you know, that stuff cleans much better. When I run out, I go down to Grey Goose. Someone should do a study on some piece of rock to see if they will ever really save the planet...

[rich k]

thanks for the comment mcgarnickle. you sound like an extremely intelligent person.