Tag Archives: Kim Momb

Rock Climbing Holds and Pole Barns

What do Rock Climbing Holds have to do with Pole Barns?

Among other things my late cousin Kim Momb was an avid rock climber, before he became world famous as a mountaineer. (Read about some of Kim’s exploits here: https://www.everesthistory.com/climbers/kimmomb.htm).

Well Kim was a rock climber way before it became popular and a proliferation of climbing walls began to crop up seemingly everywhere. I will confess to both a fear of heights and an ignorance as to climbing walls right now, so we can remove it from the table.

When I read about a business called So ILL Holds, I was intrigued. Brothers Daniel and David Chancellor started the business is 2002 on the porch of a college house in Carbondale, IL. The brothers were handcrafting eccentric and exciting holds for rock climbing walls.

In 2004 the pole barn came into play – as the 1000 square foot pole barn next to their shared house became their operations center. David would start the manufacturing process in the pole barn during the day and at night the two brothers would lead a student workforce in pulling, polishing and packaging Holds for sale.

At this point of their story, I want to know what the heck a rock climbing hold even is. Obviously it was enough of a business to require a team working in a fairly good sized pole barn to pull it off.
I naturally visited my friend, the sum of all human knowledge Wikipedia to find: “A climbing hold is a shaped grip that is usually attached to a climbing wall so climbers can grab or step on it. On most walls, climbing holds are arranged in paths, called routes, by specially trained route setters. Climbing holds come in a large array of sizes and shapes to provide different levels of challenge to a climber. Climbing holds are either bolted to a wall via hex-head bolts and existing t-nuts or they are screwed on with several small screws. In extreme cases, concrete anchors may be used (if putting holds on the underside of a bridge, for example).

Whether your fledgling business is rock climbing holds or custom widgets, chances are a post frame building could be in your future as an affordable and adaptable design solution.

The Chancellor brothers? Well they just launched a successful Kickstarter campaign raising $154,000 to bring a set of climbing shoes to market!

Snow Sliding off a Roof

Snow Slides Off Roof – Kills Child

I’ve recently been searching the pages of the IBC (International Building Code) for a section which I was just certain I had viewed in an earlier Code edition – preventing accumulated snow  sliding off roofs, in particular at door openings. I even went so far as to post a query in a Building Code Forum I am a member of. The other members confirmed I will be futile in my search however one of them did come up with a link to a very sad story: https://www.foxnews.com/us/2016/02/27/snow-from-idaho-cabin-roof-buries-3-children-1-dead-2-in-hospital.html

These could very well have been your or my children or grandchildren – or even an adult, in the event of a large snow slide.

I will admit to being sensitive to snow killing people, especially loved ones, ever since the tragic death of my cousin Kim, due to lots of falling snow back in 1986 (read more about Kim Momb here: https://publications.americanalpineclub.org/articles/13198701502/Avalanche-British-Columbia-Selkirk-Mountains).

Snow sliding down mountains happens and is pretty hard to prevent in the back country. Snow sliding off building roofs can be avoided and with it tragic events such as the death of a child.

How can snow sliding off a roof be prevented?

By use of a properly design snow restraint system.

Before any modifications are done to an existing roof, the structure needs to be reviewed to determine if it is designed to support the weight of snow remaining on top, rather than sliding off. Provisions of the model Building Codes, allow for reductions in the design roof load for snow sliding off, especially in the case of unobstructed slippery roofs (e.g. steel roofing).

If your building is designed with a Cs value of less than 1.0, then it is not a candidate for a snow retention system.

Snow retention systems can be as simple as the steel trim snow breaks which I have screwed down to the roofs of my home and two post frame buildings at Newman Lake, Washington. Without them, the 7/12 slope roofs will allow 18 to 24 inches of snow to accumulate, before sliding off with the speed of an oncoming freight train. When a mass of snow of this volume hits the ground, the noise if both deafening and frightening and the impact would most certainly not be healthy for anyone hit by it.

For more information on snow retention systems, please check out this article on snow brakes: https://www.hansenpolebuildings.com/2012/02/snow-brakes/