No more falling on my butt please

**Paladin03** · 06-27-2011, 16:35

Hey Guys,

So a couple of weekends ago, I took the girl friend to lake elizabeth park thinking to give her, her first hammock experience. I bought an Eno doubble deluxe and hooked up a polyester webbing suspension to it that I tested for an hour or so during the week. Well I rig it u up fine and sit down on it Anyway the GF goes to sit down on the hammock with me and I hear some faint cracking, I figure its the webbing pulling taught. The unthinkable happens, in less than a second, we're sitting on the floor! The webbing failed. Luckily she wasn't hurt, but the day was kinda shot. Anyway here's some pics of the webbing:

http://i.imgur.com/L04aG.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/kFPdi.jpg

I have absolutely no idea what happened. I weigh about 225-230 and she weighs about 115-120. The carabiners were rated for 1100lbs and I've been assured that the webbing was also rated for over 1000lbs. The double deluxe is rated for #400 but the hammock was completely fine. The stitching didn't even rip on the webbing. This particular set of webbing had been used about 6 times prior for periods of 30min-1hour each only by me. The webbing was stored out of the sunlight in a silnylon stuffsack with the rest of the suspension system.

I can only think of three reasons why the strap could have failed. 1 it rubbed awkwardly on the carabiner (there was no evidence to this). The webbing may have been defective. I also think its possible that the tree bark was at fault. Maybe it wore out the webbing due to the prior 6 times it was used?

So, I'm not feeling so "secure" in the durability or longevity of hammock suspension at this point, so I'm turning to the experts. PLEASE HELP :-/

I'm sort of rethinking how I might go about rigging up something more durable. I've already received replacement webbing, and I've purchased wire gate oval carabiners which while bigger and heavier than the old ones are much smoother as they don't have rivets on the gate, and they have a 5000lb+ rating. I'm wondering if climbing webbing might work instead of the thinner polyester strapping I'm using now. Something like this
http://www.mountaingear.com/pages/pr...tem/640108/N/0 If I could simply switch the webbing to something more durable, I think that would be ideal. I'm willing to carry more weight to not worry that I'll wind up on my but again.

If that won't work than maybe I can simply attach another set of webbing to the hammock with another set of carabiners as a fail safe?

What do you guys think.

**Ramblinrev** · 06-27-2011, 16:41

How old is the webbing and where did you get it originally?

**MAD777** · 06-27-2011, 16:51

What an experience you had!
I can only add that you probably don't want to go to climbing webbing because most climbing applications want as much stretch as possible to slowly break a fall. In theory, as hangers we are not going to fall ... oh well, so much for the theory!

**Boothill** · 06-27-2011, 17:01

from what little i know on the subject, depending on you had the hammock hung you could of easily put more that 1000lbs of force on the webbing and it simply couldn't handle it

some people use the rule of 10x for suspension strength, so if you had 350lbs in the hammock then you would need 3500lb load limit suspension, although most seem to agree that this is overkill and you can get by with 4x suspension, but if you had 350lbs in the hammock you would still want a suspension capable of handling 1400lbs. at the 4x rule, here's a couple links to check out

http://www.hammockforums.net/forum/s...ad.php?t=29170

http://www.hammockforums.net/gallery...l_original.jpg

boot

**Ramblinrev** · 06-27-2011, 17:10

Originally Posted by Boothill

from what little i know on the subject, depending on you had the hammock hung you could of easily put more that 1000lbs of force on the webbing and it simply couldn't handle it

That is rather dependent on how tightly it is strung. If the hammock was at it's 35* or so then I don't think you can trace the culprit to excess weight. But if it was strung tight you could very well be right. But even then you need to consider safe working load vs breaking load. Breaking load of 1200# = ~300# SWL. That was clearly overloaded.

Which comes back to the question of where the webbing was purchased. I saw that kind of damage in some webbing I bought from WW in the fabric department. Turns out it wasn't polyester at all. It was Olefin which has the strength and durability of a 90# weakling on Muscle Beach.

**Boothill** · 06-27-2011, 17:18

Originally Posted by Ramblinrev

That is rather dependent on how tightly it is strung. If the hammock was at it's 35* or so then I don't think you can trace the culprit to excess weight. But if it was strung tight you could very well be right. But even then you need to consider safe working load vs breaking load. Breaking load of 1200# = ~300# SWL. That was clearly overloaded.

this was my though that maybe he had the hammock strung real tight, didn't really say in the OP

could be as simple as bad webbing too just like you said, just one more advantage of buying stuff from the vendors on here, you get great customer service and they know exactly what they are selling to you

boot

**Paladin03** · 06-27-2011, 17:32

Webbing wasn't more than a month old. It was purchased to use with my eno single nest for hiking on the weekends. I purchased the webbing from a reputable dealer on here, and he has already exchanged the webbing. However, I am uneasy about testing it again without further reinforcement.

**Ramblinrev** · 06-27-2011, 17:42

Originally Posted by Paladin03

Webbing wasn't more than a month old. It was purchased to use with my eno single nest for hiking on the weekends. I purchased the webbing from a reputable dealer on here, and he has already exchanged the webbing. However, I am uneasy about testing it again without further reinforcement.

couple of things to check in the future. When you hang... make sure you don't string it too tight. About 35* below horizontal is considered optimal by folks on here.

One thing that has caused problems for me in the past... make sure the webbing is not caught in the gate of the biner. A couple of times I have trapped the edge of the webbing in the key lock of the biner and it has started to cut/rip the webbing.

Try to have the webbing come out of the biner at an open angle. I have made the mistake at times of bringing the webbing out so it almost doubles back on itself rather than simply running through the biner.

I understand your feeling of concern. Been there/done that. But you have good equipment and knowledgeable people behind your purchase. I would say if you hang carefully and check all the little niggle stuff you should be fine. As far as the bark causing a problem... I don't think is likely. The webbing is used to protect the bark.

**Paladin03** · 06-27-2011, 17:48

It has been suggested that I could switch over to whoopie slings, but as I understand it, these still rely on webbing to attach to the trees? Would that webbing still be susceptible to breakage?

Okay, what about switching out the webbing for dyneema or spectra? Does anyone know where I could find 1inch/25mm dyneema/spectra/amsteel webbing?

**Strung out** · 06-27-2011, 18:17

I have plenty of 2500# (edit 3000#)test polyester webbing that I would be happy to donate to your cause.

Let me know if you need any loops sewn into it, and length needed.

sorry to hear of your fall.