Hi folks-
I posted this on another forum as well, so apologies to those who've seen it already.
**Mods, I've included an image of a page from Mors' book Bushcraft: Outdoor Skills and Wilderness Survival. Please let me know if I should remove it. **
I was reading through Mors Kochanski's Bushcraft, and I came across a figure in the Bindcraft chapter about using hooks to make 2 strand twisted cordage. Many of you probably have seen or done this before, but since I had just started in on a ridgeline for bushclass, and since I'm still pretty slow at 2 strand twisting, I thought I'd give this rig a try and see how it went.
The catch for me is that most of my free time these days is after work and after all the kids are in bed. Since I didn't have any willow saplings, I thought I might try a man-made substitute... plastic hangers!
I cut the hangers to make a two forks, and used a snap hook that I had laying around. I tied the snap hook up and put a loop in the 6" of 2 strand twist in some polyester cord that I had already started by hand, and loaded the hooks in a figure-8 winding motion as shown in Mors' book.
It took me the same amount of time to do about 6 FEET with the hooks as it did to do 6 inches by hand (I told you I'm slow). Everything from the knot to the end of the cord was by hand. The rest was with the hooks. You can see how the cord was slipping on the hangers.
Finished product is just over 3-1/2 arm lengths (~22ft) with a whipped eye on one end.
I found out a few things (some of which are dead obvious, but sort of "ooooohhhhhhh I get it" moments)
1. Man-made cordage slips on plastic hangers (duh). It worked, but it was tricky to keep loaded.
2. It was tough to keep the same amount of twist in both hooks and unload them equally. Part of that was the slipping, and part was that I need more practice.
3. Every so often you need to open your arms wide to force the twist to get tighter towards the snap hooked end. This would be no big deal if I could do the whole thing in one shot, but I was making a 20ft+ line in a 12ft room. I had to stop, make a loop at the end of what I had twisted, then put that in the snap hook and continue from there. The first time I did this when I went to open my arms wide, the hanging 8ft or so from the first go got wrapped around as the new part twisted. I had to untangle it all then bundle the part already done to the snap hook so it wouldn't bind up.
4. You can screw up really fast, but it's relatively easy to fix. For some reason, after one of the resets I started twisting the hooks in opposite directions rather than the same. I had to pull it apart and do it again. This made the whole thing take longer than it probably should have.
5. I had to finish the last 3ft or so by hand. I don't know if wood hooks would let you get all the way to the end or not.
Overall, it was a fun use of an hour or so. It saved me a lot of time, so hopefully this idea might be helpful to somebody. Thanks for looking.
I posted this on another forum as well, so apologies to those who've seen it already.
**Mods, I've included an image of a page from Mors' book Bushcraft: Outdoor Skills and Wilderness Survival. Please let me know if I should remove it. **
I was reading through Mors Kochanski's Bushcraft, and I came across a figure in the Bindcraft chapter about using hooks to make 2 strand twisted cordage. Many of you probably have seen or done this before, but since I had just started in on a ridgeline for bushclass, and since I'm still pretty slow at 2 strand twisting, I thought I'd give this rig a try and see how it went.
The catch for me is that most of my free time these days is after work and after all the kids are in bed. Since I didn't have any willow saplings, I thought I might try a man-made substitute... plastic hangers!
I cut the hangers to make a two forks, and used a snap hook that I had laying around. I tied the snap hook up and put a loop in the 6" of 2 strand twist in some polyester cord that I had already started by hand, and loaded the hooks in a figure-8 winding motion as shown in Mors' book.
It took me the same amount of time to do about 6 FEET with the hooks as it did to do 6 inches by hand (I told you I'm slow). Everything from the knot to the end of the cord was by hand. The rest was with the hooks. You can see how the cord was slipping on the hangers.
Finished product is just over 3-1/2 arm lengths (~22ft) with a whipped eye on one end.
I found out a few things (some of which are dead obvious, but sort of "ooooohhhhhhh I get it" moments)
1. Man-made cordage slips on plastic hangers (duh). It worked, but it was tricky to keep loaded.
2. It was tough to keep the same amount of twist in both hooks and unload them equally. Part of that was the slipping, and part was that I need more practice.
3. Every so often you need to open your arms wide to force the twist to get tighter towards the snap hooked end. This would be no big deal if I could do the whole thing in one shot, but I was making a 20ft+ line in a 12ft room. I had to stop, make a loop at the end of what I had twisted, then put that in the snap hook and continue from there. The first time I did this when I went to open my arms wide, the hanging 8ft or so from the first go got wrapped around as the new part twisted. I had to untangle it all then bundle the part already done to the snap hook so it wouldn't bind up.
4. You can screw up really fast, but it's relatively easy to fix. For some reason, after one of the resets I started twisting the hooks in opposite directions rather than the same. I had to pull it apart and do it again. This made the whole thing take longer than it probably should have.
5. I had to finish the last 3ft or so by hand. I don't know if wood hooks would let you get all the way to the end or not.
Overall, it was a fun use of an hour or so. It saved me a lot of time, so hopefully this idea might be helpful to somebody. Thanks for looking.