It was many years ago, but I ascended the SW ridge and descended the steep chute to the mine. There's some class 3 scrambling along the upper part of the ridge that made it a much more enjoyable ascent route than all that loose scree in the chute above the mine. The chute IMO is a nice descent route.
Here's a photo of Mount Tom I took during that trip from Peak 12200+ to the west. Both routes are easily visible.
Hope this helped.
Edit: A few more pics of the SW Ridge:
This looks up from near the beginning of the class 3 sections:
- Note: I think nearly all the steepest portions can be bypassed by staying on the left (NW) side of the ridge. In fact, I recall following a climbers use trail in several spots.
- UpperTom.jpg (706.11 KiB) Viewed 2302 times
A view looking down at the same section of ridge from the summit:
- Not much exposure- just a bit of scrambling mixed with class 2, as I remember.
- Tom3.jpg (731.86 KiB) Viewed 2302 times
This view looks up from along the road to the mine. The summit is in the center; the upper SW ridge is along the right skyline.
- This picture seems to confirm that there wasn't much exposure along this side of the SW ridge.
- TomFrmBelow.jpg (845.74 KiB) Viewed 2302 times