Back-to-Basics Series: Installing, Removing & Moving Rock Climbing Holds

We are featuring a Back-to-Basics Series for our weekly blog posts during the month of November. These posts are ideal for those with new climbing programs or new climbing instructors. They’re also great refreshers for experienced instructors, or those in need of some retraining. Last week’s post featured safety rules and day one activities. This week it's all about hand holds.

Installing, Moving and Removing Hand Holds

Unless you chose self-installation for your Traverse Wall®, the hand holds on your climbing wall were already installed for you. You might wonder, why would I need to install or remove hand holds myself? This is a great question and there are several answers:

1. You may decide to add more holds to your climbing wall to bring some new challenges and variety to the climbing experience.
2. You might want to relocate your existing hand holds for the same reason as above. This is called route setting and you can learn more about it in this past blog post.
3. Over time, hand holds get dirty and need to be cleaned. The proper way to clean hand holds starts with removing them from the climbing wall. Check back in 2 weeks for our blog post about cleaning your climbing wall. 
4. Spinning hand holds is something you might also encounter, so knowing how to properly tighten a hold is important to know.

Before you attempt to install, move or remove hand holds, please review the instructions. It’s important that you follow the installation instructions carefully to avoid stripping the t-nuts or improperly installing the holds.

Hand Hold Installation Instructions

(Please read all instructions thoroughly before starting to install.)

1. Place hand hold over the desired hole (t-nut) in the climbing wall, lining up the hand hold with the hole in the climbing wall.
2. Insert the bolt through the hand hold and into the climbing wall.
3. Using an Allen wrench (included), gently start threading the bolt into the t-nut. Take care not to cross-thread the T-nut.
4. If you feel resistance while starting to thread the bolt, immediately stop, remove the bolt and readjust the hand hold and bolt angle.
5. When the bolt threads are started properly, continue threading the bolt until it becomes tight, then give another 3/4 of a turn. Do not overtighten the bolt.

Removing and Moving Hand Holds:

1. Using the Allen wrench, remove the bolt by turning it counterclockwise.
2. When moving hand holds to t-nuts that have never been used, it is especially important to follow the installation instructions carefully. See above.