Piton

This article is about the rock climbing tool. There is a pair of mountains known as the Piton Mountains.

Several pitons

Old angle pitons

In climbing, a piton (pronounced Pee'-ton, also called a pin or peg) is a metal spike (usually steel) that is driven into a crack or seam in the rock with a hammer, and which acts as an anchor to protect the climber against the consequences of a fall, or to assist progress in aid climbing. Pitons are equipped with an eye hole or a ring to which a carabiner is attached; the carabiner can then be directly or indirectly attached (through more equipment) to a climbing rope.

Pitons were the original equipment for protection and are still used where there is no alternative. However, the repeated hammering and extraction of pitons damages the rock, and climbers who subscribe to the ethic of clean climbing eschew their use as far as possible. Today, pitons have largely been replaced by nuts and cams, although they are often still found in place on some established climbing routes.

There are many different styles of pitons available. The most common are:

• Lost Arrow - A tapered piton that performs well in medium sized seams.
  
• Knifeblade - Also known as Bugaboos, a thin straight piton, perfect for thin, deep seams.
  
• Angle - A piton made of steel sheet bent into a "U", "V", or "Z" shape; perfect for larger seams and cracks, where the steel actually deforms as the piton is placed. The largest pitons are angles called bongs, named for the sound they produce while being hammered into place. Bongs have become rare with the advent of the SLCD, more commonly known as a cam, which can generally protect the same crack width clean.
  
• RURP - Short for Realized Ultimate Reality Piton, this small piton (size of a postage stamp) is useful for thin, shallow seams. This piton was designed by Tom Frost and Yvon Chouinard at the Great Pacific Iron works in the 1960's. It is not a strong piece, and is mainly used for aid climbing, although it can feature as protection on extreme free routes (e.g. Rurp The Wild Berserk (E6 6b) at The Brand, Leicestershire, UK).

Early pitons generally were made of soft malleable irons and steel and would deform to the shape of the crack when driven in to rock. This made them difficult to remove without damaging the piton, so they were frequently left in place. Thus they became fixed anchor points on a climb. Further more soft pitons worked better with softer rock. The hard granite of Yosemite Valley required harder steel to form a stronger bond. In addition as very long routes began to be developed in Yosemite Valley, it became impractical and too costly to fix routes. Pitons would need to be used again and again on subsequent pitches. Leaving gear also went against the ethics and mores of many climbers. John Salathe pioneered designs using hardened steels which were much tougher than the early pitons. Salathe's pins, called Lost Arrows, resisted deformation and thus were easier to remove and reuse. They suffered much less damage during removal and could be reused essentially indefinitely.