My simple TurtleDog solution

**Morticiaskeeper** · 06-14-2015, 11:19

I've been playing about with a 3 x 2 wood stand, but commercial campsites tend to frown on the DIY look. So I figured that it had to look more like tent poles. 1" conduit with a centre Y shape made from 20mm x 2mm alloy strip and 6mm bolts.

I wondered about a suspension that would positively anchor the legs at the right angles. Three loops of 550 cord, one for each direction, to keep the suspension central. The harder the downward force, the tighter the tripod becomes.

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**aikirunner** · 06-14-2015, 13:31

Are the bolts going through a hole in the conduit?

**Morticiaskeeper** · 06-14-2015, 14:13

Yes, the bolts go all the way through the conduit. I drove a wooden dowel into the end of the conduit, so there is a solid at the point the bolt goes through.

A dowel plug is also driven into the other end of the conduit, then sunk in by 2mm, so the conduit can bite into the ground.

**woknblues** · 06-15-2015, 23:15

If love a few more pics if you had them. Then of course a cut list so I can go to hd and make one.

**Morticiaskeeper** · 06-16-2015, 12:51

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You can see my other hammock stand projects in the background. The string hammock in the picture is just for gear stowage. The green cord hanging from the tripod has a marlin spike hitch for the hammock to attach to.

There isn't much more to see, but I can describe it for you.

Each tripod consist of three 1.8m 25mm conduit. The top bar consists of two more pieces, with the screw thread connector to join them. If you can find a better way of making the join, DO IT, I don't like the way this bends :-(

Each top bar has a T bar through the end to keep cordage from slipping. The T bar is an 8mm bolt, with the head chopped off. Nuts hold it to the top bar and it is covered with old rubber pipe and insulation tape.

Drive a dowel into the ends of each tripod conduit, then cut it off. I found that a broom handle, whittled down to a tight fit, then drifted in with a mallet, worked well. At the ground end of each conduit, use a spacer to drive the dowel into the conduit by a couple of mm. This will make the tripod dig into soft ground for stability.

The brackets are made from 20mm x 2mm aluminium strip. Each piece is bent to 120 degrees, with two holes drilled at each end. The bracket is assembled with bolts through the inboard hole, with a 25mm aluminium tube spacer. Eventually you will have a Y bracket, consisting of three plates, bolted with spacers.

I put some hooks into the top ends of the tripod conduit, then bound three together with 550 cord. This gives a basic tripod, in fact, with the suspension I was using, it took my weight, set the tripod up with the legs evenly spaced. I chose a spacing of 34" between the feet. I then offered up a bracket from below, pushing it as high as it would go, without the top conduit ends being forced apart. I then marked where to drill the holes in the conduit. Untie everything and drill the conduit. Bolt three pieces together through the bracket and you have a freestanding tripod. Also useful for hanging a kettle over a fire!

The suspension consists of three 550 para cord loops, with an overhand knot tied into one end, creating a big loop and a small loop. The big loops slip over the tripod legs, while the small loops drop underneath, one in each gap. A carabiner clips the three small loops together. Because we use three cords, spaced around the tripod, everything is kept central, and when weight is applied, the tripod is pulled into itself for stability.

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Two 550 cord loops attach the carabiner to the top bar. The hammock hangs off the ends of the bar.

The three cord loop system at the top of the tripod has worked on various stands for three nights and very many afternoons. It's quick and simple.

If anyone has any better ideas, tell me :-)

**zukiguy** · 06-16-2015, 19:45

Looking at the pictures I think you're likely to have a catastrophic top bar failure somewhere down the road. The point where the hammock is hanging from the top bar appears to be a good foot from the tripods (and the ends of the top bar). Ideally I believe you're going to want those points to be one and the same. Ideally you want the top bar to be taking a strictly a compressive load (the hammock trying to squeeze the top bar, making it shorter) and at the same time the tripods only only holding up each end of the bar. The foot or so of difference on each end between the hammock suspension and hanging point creates a bunch of extra leverage trying to bend the top bar. There's probably a cool diagram or drawing somewhere in the turtledog stand thread but I can't find one at the moment. Hopefully this long ramble makes some sort of sense.

**Morticiaskeeper** · 06-17-2015, 01:38

That's just the gear hammock! The main hammock hangs straight down from the tripod.

**Nift** · 06-17-2015, 05:22

Instead of the conduit couplers, which were used for testing the original turtledog stand using different materials, I would make a dowel that is about 2.5-3.5 inches or about 85mm make the midpoint. Drive it into one side. Bolt through the top bar just behind it or something as a stopper for the dowel, then put the other side into the other half the same way. This should be a lot more stable than the 1/4-1/2 inch connection the coupler makes.

Also from looking at your first picture on original post it looks like the hammock is connected to the cross bar just outside of the cross bar's vertical connection. This will cause the cross bar to bend upwards. You want the hammock and the vertical support to be inline with each other exactly. Then the cross bar should see no vertical pulling and deflect none to almost none. Coupler might work better for you then.

**Morticiaskeeper** · 06-17-2015, 12:07

Inside the top bar join is a foot long steel tube, it isn't a perfect fit, but with a bit of duct tape, it stays on one bar. I'm wondering about getting a decent coupler machined.

As to the hang point, I did have an eye bolt on the loops with an eye nut below, but replaced it with this setup to gain a bit of height. Re-rigging the loops to the outside of the tommy bar will keep things more aligned.