Soft hanks and Soft shackles

[Jack]

In the process of re-rigging my boat over to synthetics, I have also been finding new ways to attach things with these amazing lines. The goal is to get away from steel and weight and holes in the boat as much as possible.. Or as much as is practical anyhow.

I posted some shots of "soft hanks" which came about as guys thought they wanted a better way to attach a sail to the stay. With bronze hanks (like I am currently using) there was the concern of chaff on a synthetic forestay. I have not tried these on the sail (I actually want to see if i get any chaff, I am betting I won't) but I have some made up, and have used them in place of steel shackles. So far so good.
I came up with the idea for this halyard soft shackle recently after seeing how the soft hank worked. I have not used it enough to recommend it. But they are easy to make and fun to work with.
The halyard rope is 3/16" Dynex. Very light, very strong.
Anyhow the photos of this ongoing project are at:

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ner-22345.html

[Renoir]

Thanks Jack. I need a better description on how to make these things and use them. I can't quite "get it" just with the photos and little description. Hope you make a more detailed description that my slow mind can grasp.

I have to admit that even with Brion's books it wasn't until I bought his DVD video that I finally really "got it" in making splices in double-braid Dacron and nylon. This is after more than 30 years of making eye splices (yeah I admit that).

Thanks again,
Rick

[Jack]

Renoir, I posted some more photos at the same site that i were developing this week. I was describing two different Items that use the same set up. I have the soft hank/soft shackle (same thing) And I have the soft shackle that is spliced onto the end of the halyard.
So far I have seen no failures or damage, and I have been putting this stuff in some funny places that may not work over time, but I am trying to abuse things a little to see what we can get away with. I cannot really say these are the next great thing because i have not used them enough. I suspect they will be, but need more time and abuse to find out.
You need a hollow 12 braided line made out of Dynex, Spectra, Amsteel, all of them are UMHWPE.
I use 3/16" Dynex for my halyards. The black soft hanks are made from 5mm Marow Dux (a new product)
The halyard is simple. Just make a a tail as long as you need (about 5"plus enough for a stopper knot) Run the tail back inside the body of the line which will give you the eye you need. Bring the tail out the side of the line and tie a stopper knot in it. What you end up with is an eye with a flexible cover between the eye and the stopper knot.
To use it just slid the cover back a bit to open up the eye. Put the stopper knot inside and milk the cover back to the eye.
To make a soft shackle it is basically the same, except when you tie the stopper knot, you tie both the covers end and the tail end together.
It will take some fooling around to get it right. That is part of the fun of doing this kind of stuff.
Hope this helps.

[petermat]

Earlier today I had never heard of, let alone seen a "soft shackle", so please bear with me. I have looked at several threads here, and also several suppliers sites, and I am still very unclear. (I have looked at Jacks photos.) OK I see there is a stopper knot at one end and what looks like an eye splice at the other end. The stopper knot fits (just) through the eye. So why does the stopper knot not come back out of the eye, particularly in a flogging (jib) situation? And why are they so expensive - the cheapest I found was $30! For a few inches of line!

[Jack]

Go to:

http://www.colligomarine.com/

There are videos on operation of the softie, as well as how to make one up yourself.

Good job on research, this thread is 23 months old!

[petermat]

Jack,
Thanks for the info - the video in particular answered all my queries on how it works.

I can see uses, but in my current state of slowly decreasing ignorance, I seem to see one significant limitation. With a spinnaker type snap shackle, or a regular shackle with a bar, you can attach a line to the shackle by knot, whip or splice, and be confident that the shackle and line will stay together. I mean particularly while not in use. This does not seem possible with the soft shackle as shown. If one simply put an eye splice in the end of the sheet / halyard ... then the eye end of the shackle is likely to easily slip through the eye splice. One cannot seize or sew anything to the soft shackle as portraid, since the cover of the soft shackle line must be able to move over its core. The only way I can see of meeting this requirement would be to make the soft shackle with a very much longer loop, seized in the middle making a figure 8 with one loop the disconectable part. This disconectable part would have to be long enough that the cover could be pulled back enough despite the seizing.

Or am I still missing something?

Peter

[petermat]

OK, I am starting to get the message. Just (maybe) a couple more questions. How much is this all Dependant an the properties of dyneema? The hollow core is obviously crucial, but is there any other cheaper type of line which could be used for experiments or even real use in less strength critical applications?

[CAM]

ran across this the other day:




Original source here:
http://wmriggingnewport.wordpress.com/

[Jack]

I do not have any steel shackles on my boat anymore. Lashings, Softies, Spliced eyes, etc. have replaced all the SS. I suppose you could get some cheap hollow core poly (like water ski rope) and have at it if you want to practice. I had some on the side of my avon that came with the boat. It was getting horrible on the hands, so I replaced it with some new stuff. But I would never want to put any kind of a load on it.

[John D]

Cam,

Thanks for the link. Lots of neat solutions are shown there.

Peter,

You can practice with any hollow single braid rope with a good hand. If you have any Regatta Braid or Tenex lying around you could use that. However using UHMWPE (Ultra High Molecular Weight PolyEthylene [Dyneema, Spectra, etc.]) for soft shackles makes sense both because of the physical properties (strong and slippery) and the cost.

OK, I can hear you saying "Sure, strong is good and slippery makes it easy to open and close a soft shackle hundreds of times without it binding up. But cost? That stuff is very expen$ive"

UHMWPE rope is only expensive when you are comparing it to a nylon or polyester rope of the same diameter. If you compare a UHMWPE rope to other ropes with the same strength, the prices are close and often the UHMWPE is less expensive. As a rough rule of thumb UHMWPE is as strong as polyester with twice the diameter.

Less rope is needed to create a soft shackle with 5mm (3/16") UHMWPE than with 10mm (3/8") polyester because you need more rope to tie the diamond knot in the larger diameter line. And four UHMWPE soft shackles will weigh less than one polyester soft shackle of the same strength (and UHMWPE floats while polyester sinks).

If you wander down to the dinghy section of your local chandlery you can find 3mm, 2.5mm and even 2mm single braid. I’ve used the 2.5mm to make some super skinny soft shackles to hold my power cord where it hangs from the lifelines at dock. The 2.5mm is only rated at 1,500 lbs. (giving a SWL of 300 to 750 lbs, depending on your safety factor) which limits where it can be used, but the material cost per shackle was less than a buck.


Kohlhoff, the German rigging company, has a slightly different method of making their soft shackles (Kohloff calls them loop shackles or twin loop shackles). Rather than passing the rope into itself (splice style), they pass the rope through itself (like beginning a brummel) and have two parallel legs for the length of the shackle. From the pictures they appear to finish with a locked brummel and a diamond knot. Take a look at http://www.loopblock.com/docs/Loop%20Shackles.pdf


John D.