Any resources for splicing more advanced tenex sling configurations?

eyehearttrees

eyehearttrees

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I've got one of those x-slings that has 2 pieces on one end of the sling and the splicing work is so....awesome, for lack of better vocabulary lol. My sling is for crotches only (though I suspect I could use a prusik to choke it on spars, still haven't confirmed that idea is a no-go! It's their 3-ring 3/4" 5' sling) but I've got a loose Safebloc so I'll be needing to make something that's spar-friendly (any thoughts/figures/wild-speculation on relative strengths would be appreciated IE whoopeis v loopies versus doubling the rope at the hardware then the rope itself is a loop, etc - a 10' dead-eye sling is automatically using 1 leg of tenex/ultrex, some of these other setups look like they're using 2 legs of the sling which is obviously huge as the sling is significantly weaker than the hardware it holds)

I was close on my Blue Moon, am pretty sure I'd nail it if I tried again I just don't see much need for splicing climbing line anymore (don't climb moving-rope systems so never use my rope-ends in a meaningful way..) but I want to make more than just the Safebloc sling am unsure exactly what yet but intend to get at least another piece of hardware to put on another sling (didn't realize splicing this type of rope would be so simple til I got the 3-ring sling and saw how loose/sloppy the braiding is on 3/4" tenex tec, I've no doubt I could do regular splices but would like to make at least 2 slings with this cordage that are more advanced than long dead-eye slings!)

Thanks for any thoughts on the relative-strengths of different splices to hold a Bloc/hardware, and for any reco'd resources on more advanced splices like loopies (these look the strongest to me, I'd initially thought that the type where it's just a loop, with both 'legs' of the loop crossing each other right as they splice/encircle the ring, but in one of d.driver's videos there's a quick clip that shows - for a split second but I paused it lol - a bunch of ripped x-slings, almost all broke clean at some mid-section of the sling not at-splice except for the loop-sling which had snapped at the splicing, that was the spot/splice I woulda guessed to be the strongest of all these configurations! So yeah that's how novice I am, any resources/pointers would be greatly appreciated, hopefully some day I'll be confident enough to try splicing double-braid again though as mentioned it wouldn't be Blue Moon it'd be a bull line, can see real value in being able to always have a nice spliced end on my rigging line.....although if I choose Polydyne 5/8" which I probably will I expect it'll hardly be easier than BM is, lol will see I guess)
 
And any advice on purchasing cordage would be appreciated as well, I see Gap has free shipping and they're $1.50 a foot for 3/4" yalex/tenex (like to go with yale if possible) so figure I'll just get like 25% extra length than I expect I'll need, have a feeling that if an end is loose I'll lose inches just securing it, honestly this stuff felt....almost cheap when I first held it, though I can see its appeal / am loving it myself, just feels like strings of plastic though lol am glad it came with a chafe sleeve I use those on double-braids where it's redundant I imagine this thing wouldn't last so long without a chafe sleeve....any suggestions on places that do by-foot cordage and have chafe sleeves would be appreciated, gonna check if gap stocks it they splice so they must (their free-shipping has me really hoping to give them a try for my next buy, a no-minimum free-ship place would have me buying so much more am surprised that the bigger retailers don't have lower minimums (they're all $100 min, excepting bartlett's 1st-time purchase, no?)

//still a bit surprised that these slings seem to wanna break at their centers instead of at splice, gives me so much more faith in spliced-tenex for stationary-slings am really hoping loopies/etc aren't that hard to get down, I look at the 2-ringed-end of my 3-ring sling and can't really tell just how hard it was to get 2 rings spliced to 2 legs that quickly splice together to 1 leg, but knowing you can do that has me wanting to know how so badly, as much as I'm eager to try a 2-safebloc's on 1-end sling (basal anchor of course, for medium-weight effortless solo rigging ;D ) the reality is that it's so cheap that I'd want a few 'backup' slings and would just get like 5/8" tenex and some generic '3/4" rope thimbles' which are like $5 apiece, I use the 1/2" variety on a few things right now and have for a while and wouldn't trade it for anything except x-ring style terminations, my first order for Safebloc cordage would have an extra 30' or whatever for (2-3) 5/8" slings that'd just have a 3/4" steel rope thimble eye spliced into each end, and I'm saying 3/4" thimbles for 5/8" tenex/yalex because this stuff is not 3/4" no matter what it's labelled, have to pinch my calipers to get 7/8" on this "3/4ich" tenex lol
 
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Gap is great...I would recommend a bag o rope from treestuff if you are serious about experimenting. Great way to try different cordage and if you pair it with some good hardware maybe they will take a hint...I personally would go with the KISS principle. I have recently gone back to dead eyes because...you can keep your ring on your rope and move the sling. Can't do that with whoopies or loopies or continuous loops. My vote is for a locked brummel dead eye. Simple is often best. Happy Splicing
 
If you’re not sure how it’ll turn out, maybe practice on cheaper 3/8” or 1/2”? I’m not sure that it’s any easier or harder or the same as 3/4” Splicing anything is magic voodoo spell weaving shit to me and I happily fork over cash to the pros to do it for me lol. I might enjoy it and I do have some new tenex, ice tail, beeline,16 strands and double braids around, but even if they turn out looking great I probably wouldn’t trust my own work enough. I pay for the peace of mind too I guess.
I’ve kinda enjoyed sewing some eyes and slings too but I’ll probably never use that stuff either. I’m a worry wart.
 
Brocky said:
Use the code TREECLIMB at Gap and get ten percent off also.
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AAAand my next order's location is now settled ;D Thanks! Was finding them to be a great-looking operation so even better!!

While I'm hoping I can find an easily-spliceable double-braid to use instead of yalex/tenex, I'll still be buying the HMPE(yalex/tenex) hollow-braid as well just in case I ruin my double-braid splice like I did with Blue Moon, BUT I found that this 't-rex' version from Teuflbrg is supposedly a big improvement on Samson's version in terms of the fibers not picking, would love if anyone knew where Yalex fit in relative to Tenex and T-Rex (want to stay with Yale as much as possible, and dislike that I can't seem to find whether Yalex is the best, or worst, of the 3 HMPE hollow-braids mentioned here!)

Again thanks for the coupon, have taken a major beating on buying gear this year am probably nearing the 4k mark at this point would have to check my master-list lol but anything that saves is greatly appreciated!!! Need just a handful of items to 'finish my kit' (HD rigging kit) before I'll be comfortable to talk to the guys I know who'd use me as a contract-climber, then I can start re-paying myself for the gear before the next round of upgrades lol!!!
 
RyTheTreeGuy said:
Gap is great...I would recommend a bag o rope from treestuff if you are serious about experimenting. Great way to try different cordage and if you pair it with some good hardware maybe they will take a hint...I personally would go with the KISS principle. I have recently gone back to dead eyes because...you can keep your ring on your rope and move the sling. Can't do that with whoopies or loopies or continuous loops. My vote is for a locked brummel dead eye. Simple is often best. Happy Splicing
Click to expand...

Great post!!! Thanks :)

Gap- Awesome, they seem WAY too good to be true relative to the other companies (w/ exception of Wesspur I guess?) so glad to hear there's love for them, thanks! Free shipping w/o minimum is awesome, will probably end up using them as my go-to simply because I want a single-source for most things and being able to just order whatever w/o worrying Re shipping is outstanding!

Re Bags'o'Rope, while I like the idea the reality is I can hardly squeeze the time I am looking at it as something where I'm not aiming to be a good all-around splicer so much as "I've learned how to splice these 2 cordages real well", for instance if I find that there's a double-braid that's easy-to-splice then I'll be unlikely to ever even bother splicing (or buying) yalex/tenex type cordage... Just made a thread to see whether there's any double-braids that are kinda 'slam dunk' spliceable like tenex/yalex is, but in any case I want to begin with the actual rope I'll be aiming to use, I got so close on my Blue Moon attempt and if my DIY fid was made better I would've gotten it, am pretty confident I could splice it right now if I put my afternoon to it but at this point I just don't see much use for a splice on my climb-line...but for rigging, splicing seems an important thing to know, if there's no easy double-braids then I intend to be very good at splicing these HMPE cordages like Yalex, which leads to a point from the next post:

Bango Skank said:
Splicing anything is magic voodoo spell weaving shit to me and I happily fork over cash to the pros to do it for me lol.
Click to expand...


Re trusting a splice....this is something where I've got similar 'fear of the splice' but the way I see it, my best 'insurance' is to learn splicing and get good at it, to trust my own splicing the way I trust any system I set to climb on, for instance I've got that 3-ringed X-sling, where there's 2 rings on one leg of the cord, that splicing is insane hell it's 1.6" thick at spots by the brummelling, at any rate the way this sling works when on smaller crotches is the 3 rings 'squish together', literally pinching that middle leg&ring, this squishes the tenex itself --- I look at it, consider what this is doing to the splicing, and it pisses me off that I can't tell which direction of flex is good, or bad, for the splice....if I was the one who spliced it I wouldn't be stuck looking at the thing the way I look at a hard drive or car's transmission AKA may as well be a black-box! So yeah I've got same worry but to assauge mine I think I've gotta be the one doing it.....I initially wouldn't have thought this way, and had the thought "I'd never trust a non-professional splice", however after I learned about splices and how they work I lost the fear, at least for these big HMPE hollow-braids, because it's basically 'chinese finger-trap' physics, seeing how the loopie&whoopie work really gives a lot of faith in the 'bite'/hold of a proper splice, and FWIW that splice itself is secured with whipping twine (and sometimes brummels as well) so it can't come-loose when un-loaded......I'd only learned this recently, and the idea that they can come loose un-loaded, but essentially 'get stronger' when under-load due to the 'finger-trap' effect, THEN watching videos of break-tests and seeing that, no, the finger-trap isn't the weak-spot on the sling, well, that was enough for me to have all the faith in the world, now I just gotta get my hands on it to get the experience!!

Oh and I love the idea of KISS in the context of long dead-eye's.....am a bit confused on something though, specifically in why you'd/anyone would use a dead-eye sling, or a standard/un-altered sling, over teh other? I guess I can see advantages for both types and am unsure which is better, I mean I can see a dead-eye being useful when the anchoring-point just happens to be a great fit for it to girth/cinch but a regular/standard sling (ie no dead-eye on the end) seems it'd be even more versatile, no? OH also do you know whether one or the other is able to snug-up the hardware bettter, IE getting your block/rings as tight & as high as possible?

Thanks a ton!!
 
Anyone know the guy's name, Nick-something (not Bonner), he's a very very good splicer, his avatar pic is a big portrait shot of himself....the username's on the tip of my tongue but can't remember it..
 
The three cords you mentioned are polyester not HMPE, which is short for UHMWPE = dyneema and Spectra.
 
eyehearttrees said:
Great post!!! Thanks :)

Gap- Awesome, they seem WAY too good to be true relative to the other companies (w/ exception of Wesspur I guess?) so glad to hear there's love for them, thanks! Free shipping w/o minimum is awesome, will probably end up using them as my go-to simply because I want a single-source for most things and being able to just order whatever w/o worrying Re shipping is outstanding!

Re Bags'o'Rope, while I like the idea the reality is I can hardly squeeze the time I am looking at it as something where I'm not aiming to be a good all-around splicer so much as "I've learned how to splice these 2 cordages real well", for instance if I find that there's a double-braid that's easy-to-splice then I'll be unlikely to ever even bother splicing (or buying) yalex/tenex type cordage... Just made a thread to see whether there's any double-braids that are kinda 'slam dunk' spliceable like tenex/yalex is, but in any case I want to begin with the actual rope I'll be aiming to use, I got so close on my Blue Moon attempt and if my DIY fid was made better I would've gotten it, am pretty confident I could splice it right now if I put my afternoon to it but at this point I just don't see much use for a splice on my climb-line...but for rigging, splicing seems an important thing to know, if there's no easy double-braids then I intend to be very good at splicing these HMPE cordages like Yalex, which leads to a point from the next post:




Re trusting a splice....this is something where I've got similar 'fear of the splice' but the way I see it, my best 'insurance' is to learn splicing and get good at it, to trust my own splicing the way I trust any system I set to climb on, for instance I've got that 3-ringed X-sling, where there's 2 rings on one leg of the cord, that splicing is insane hell it's 1.6" thick at spots by the brummelling, at any rate the way this sling works when on smaller crotches is the 3 rings 'squish together', literally pinching that middle leg&ring, this squishes the tenex itself --- I look at it, consider what this is doing to the splicing, and it pisses me off that I can't tell which direction of flex is good, or bad, for the splice....if I was the one who spliced it I wouldn't be stuck looking at the thing the way I look at a hard drive or car's transmission AKA may as well be a black-box! So yeah I've got same worry but to assauge mine I think I've gotta be the one doing it.....I initially wouldn't have thought this way, and had the thought "I'd never trust a non-professional splice", however after I learned about splices and how they work I lost the fear, at least for these big HMPE hollow-braids, because it's basically 'chinese finger-trap' physics, seeing how the loopie&whoopie work really gives a lot of faith in the 'bite'/hold of a proper splice, and FWIW that splice itself is secured with whipping twine (and sometimes brummels as well) so it can't come-loose when un-loaded......I'd only learned this recently, and the idea that they can come loose un-loaded, but essentially 'get stronger' when under-load due to the 'finger-trap' effect, THEN watching videos of break-tests and seeing that, no, the finger-trap isn't the weak-spot on the sling, well, that was enough for me to have all the faith in the world, now I just gotta get my hands on it to get the experience!!

Oh and I love the idea of KISS in the context of long dead-eye's.....am a bit confused on something though, specifically in why you'd/anyone would use a dead-eye sling, or a standard/un-altered sling, over teh other? I guess I can see advantages for both types and am unsure which is better, I mean I can see a dead-eye being useful when the anchoring-point just happens to be a great fit for it to girth/cinch but a regular/standard sling (ie no dead-eye on the end) seems it'd be even more versatile, no? OH also do you know whether one or the other is able to snug-up the hardware bettter, IE getting your block/rings as tight & as high as possible?

Thanks a ton!!
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What I am referring to when I say dead eye is simply your hardware on one end and a "tail" of rope on the other. You can either use a cows hitch or a timber hitch and hitch them to any place on the tree that is suitable and allows for a nice snug hitch. You can also make them at different lenghts do you are not battling with a 15' sling on a 8" limb
 
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