HM Attachments
 

It has been pretty quiet around the ol' SparTalk table lately.

At The recent Port Townsend Wooded Boat Festival, I had the pleasure of finally meeting Brion. After sitting through an hour of good education at a presentation he gave, I tagged along as Brion and the crew were busy getting a beautiful 40 something wooden boat ready to take off for the Pacific.
That were finishing up with a new staysail stay that was made from HM Dynex Dux. It was a pleasure to watch the crew go aloft and go about the business of rigging.
The whole weekend is a treat. Plenty of "eye candy" to keep the most die hard wood boat guy happy.
I wanted to throw out one something that some of you may not have seen. I cannot post photos here so I will give a link. For lack of a better name I call these "Soft Hanks" Colligo is calling the "softies"....
What I have found is they are able to replace the SS shackle in almost every place I can think of. It has been so nice to use it to attach sails at the head, and the tack. To attach blocks, sheets, you name it, I have tried it. So far so good. My most brutal test was 3 months on the hook acting as failed block on my anchor bridle. No wear that I could detect. A flattening of the rope, that you can massage back to life. But no gouged paint or loud banging!
Some of what I am doing is really trying to destruct the stuff ot see what it can take. It has been fun....!:eek:

http://tinyurl.com/m7orsv

I'm interested in the kind of knots to use. Bowlines seem to work lose. I use buntline hitches which work well, but are hard to untie. Rolling hitches seem to slip also.

I find the modified brummel makes an easy splice.

csandy,

do you mean what kind of knot to tie in HM rope? Brion and others advise to not use a knot in this stuff. It is so slick, the normal knots will just slip out. There is a really good write up by Brion in the "fairleads" section of this website. :eek:

knots
 

Hi Jack,
Back in January you were talking about these soft hanks and you said you tied stopper knots. What knot did you tie? Does/did it slip? Do you sew the knot? Just curious.
When I get my act together I'll send photos of my halyards with incorporated soft snap shackles, if that is what you could call them.
David

Hey David,
would be interesting to see what you have there. All of the softies I am using were built by Colligo. I seem to recall hearing the knots were set using a machine. I know the end is melted also by looking at them.
I did not get the name of the knot, but they published a know here that may be it:

http://www.colligomarine.com/docs/mi...topperKnot.pdf

knots
 

Thanks for that link Jack..
I have been using the oystermans stopper - it looks neater, more rounded like a crown, but even if it hasn't let go yet I am not filled with confidence in its integrity. I put a stitch in it for whatever thats worth.
I think I will change and go thrash it around when the rain stops.
David

Halyard Loop design? Any hope?
 

I worked on my photobucket today. Added some nice shots of cruising. I also added a bunch of captions. While doing this, I came to realize I had almost forgot about the "end of halyard loop" I was working on before I left Mexico.
I would like some fellow Spartalkiens to critique the halyard loop. It worked well until it didn't. it is a about half way thru the slide show.The knot slipped out of the loop. And the sail came down. It is not the same knot as is on the softies. I was able to do a quick lash with some small stuff, and it never failed...... Also, I never saw any damage, but the way the core pulled down on the cover...well....I did not like that part. Comments please!

http://tinyurl.com/ycbdfcw

Lots of cool stuff. Not sure about the halyard loop though, you still are going to have a hand sewn or pressed ring and headboard on main so a aluminum or composite shackel seems to make more sense. Kinda like asking your deck crew to thow bowlines in the gilsons to the codend so they don't have to worry about getting wacked with a big gunnebo saftey hook. They would probably just stick with the hooks.
Jake

Soft snap shackle
 

Hi Jack,
I have finally taken a few pictures of my soft snap shackle idea; I have not tested it much so am waiting for you and all others participating in this forum to shoot it down. Any ideas on changes or improvements welcome.
I hope the pictures explain all. To open the shackle hold the whipping with one hand and pull the cord. Make sure the cord is long enough so if the eye/loop collapses by mistake you can remake it by pulling the cord.
David

It might be instructive to hear the reasonings that led each knot-designer
to the structures each wrought.

It will also be instructive to view two videos of some Amsteel 3/16" line
tried with different bowlines; issues with the hi-mod fibre cordage are of
slipping and bending (strength).
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFRQcExLA34
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fy6Y2Xoo4Ak

Now, I'll guess that both inventors above want to somehow avoid "knots"
because of rumors of failure -- of rope slipping out, primarily. These rumors
have some truth, but are also of a limited domain of knots (as video-2 shows,
with a variation of the Water Bowline holding). Still, there is the issue of
knot strength (or why are you using hi-mod cordage?).

And one wants to be able to untie the attachments shown in this thread.

Critique of Jack's eye structure:
1) the loading is awkward at best on the material, pulling the core
up away from an enclosing cover;
2) the Dbl.Overhand (Strangle) stopper knot might not be all so secure
as some others (Ashley's Stopper (mis-named "Oysterman's" by him)
can show a general stopper-construction that could be more secure,
methinks :: effect a noose that nips the end).
3) it entails more splicing than seems worthwhile/necessary.

Critique of DS's eye structure:
4) this seems to address security but at the expense of strength
-- the tight bend in the S.Part spells weakness.
5) and I must invoke #2 here, also.
6) moreover, in this case, the stopper must be able to fit through
any tied-to opening (clew) ! (--in contrast to Jack's, which comes
after the small spliced eye & double-thick line goes through ...)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Here's an idea that occurs to me, taking off on Jack's idea.

Make a small eye with the brummel-like back'n'forth tucking of the
end through the S.Part, leaving a long enough end to ...

tie off the eye after the eye is inserted between the one (or two?)
of the brummel tucks through the S.Part (which, yes, means that
these might need to be spaced by more than is usual, anticipating
this construction).

So, one reeves the doubled line of the small eye through the clew,
then tucks its end between the back'n'forth weavings of the S.Part
and end in the brummel'd part, and then
bring the extra-long tail through the eye,
around the S.Part,
back through the eye,
... and finish as seems appropriate. One might even tie a stopper
in the end (ensure then that the small eye isn't TOO small for that).

Loading will scissors-pinch the brummel'd part around the inserted
eye, which cannot pull out because of the reeved tail holding it
in place. There will be two thicknesses of line through the clew,
sharing load/chafe/abrasion (and needing room).

There is yet a question of the awkwardness of this loading
at the point of the brummel -- so best at least that it be not the
one farthest from eye but closer to eye so that some sharing of
force has begun between tail & S.Part by time this tucked eye-end
intrudes upon them. Maybe tucking twice mitigates this well!?

--dl*
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