The truth about dynaglide and safety...

[TheIrishmanHangeth]

Anyways, I don't mean for things to get off course and intense with addressing and debating all the what if's as I'm probably coming across like I'm trying too hard to justify dynaglide. That was not my intention, I was merely presenting some info for the community. As always HYOH.

[GrizzlyAdams]

Paul, who told you that? Maybe we need grizz in here to clear this up

I'm kinda like the genie in the bottle, you summon him by name and he mysteriously appears....


Thought experiment. Suppose you have a ridgeline between trees made of something stretchy like nylon, and using a trucker's hitch or something you crank it up tight. The cord stretches...you are putting energy into the system...and the cord is trying to contract. The energy you've put into the system to pull the cord keeps it from contracting. Now if this was a single line ridgeline suspension and you had rings and hung a hammock from them, now there is more force pulling the cord to stretch, the body weight. A combination of what you initially put in make the cord tight and the body weight (plus geometry) makes up the tension on the cord.

Now if you're using Amsteel rather than paracord the principle is the same, just harder to see. My guess is that you take the sum of half the body weight and initial tension on the cord and divide by the sine of the angle to the try to get the effective tension on the cord.

[MrClean417]

YOU can go ahead and do your suspension as stated with Dynaglide.

I'm going to use the Amsteel.

[Cranky Bear]

YMMV but in my mind hanging my hammock *is* the same as a life and death situation.

Yep, one sharp rock and even an 18-inch fall could be disastrous, especially if you're far from medical attention. I've had my fair share of concussions (no comments from the peanut gallery). In a wilderness situation, the confusion from the concussion could kill you just as easily as the blow to the head.

I'm curious, so what are you using for your "Life and Death" suspension? Surely it must be 1" amsteel (or bigger) as your life is depending on you not falling to your death from the snap of your hammock suspension. Surely one wouldn't trust their "Life" to 7/64th amsteel? Would they? Or even worse Dynaglide.

How many have had their suspension snap? Have any of you had your suspension snap! Don't remember how many posted that they had it snap?

Whats even worse is that every time a thread like this is started there has to be controversy added and started, other than a discussion on the topic.

[Cranky Bear]

No one has stated it and maybe it's because it seems obvious but wouldn't the most likely point of failure be the hammock itself?

I'm not so sure on this. The theory behind bends (think a sharp radius like that of a knot where the rope crosses itself) and round turns (think a clove or half hitch around an object) are that when a line bends back on itself it is the stress and forces of the applied weight are now focused on the strands on the outside of the line. Which usually exceed the strength, as the rating is done for the entire rope or line not what each strand can hold (which is usually way less than the breaking strength).

A round turn helps to distribute the loads across almost all strands (can't say all and I'm sure it does not) thus increasing the load it can handle without failure, in contrast to the load the bend can handle which would be much less.

So IMO the attachment at the hammock has a great deal to do in the manner it was attached. Take for instance the Hennessy Hammock rope attachment, which is a couple round turns forming a constrictor, which I would venture to say is one of the most secure (or least line de-rating) ways to attach the line to the hammock.

There is a knot called the tension-less hitch (http://www.animatedknots.com/tensionless/) which the manner the line is used uses almost all of its strength capabilities, yet the very end of the line (where the biner is attached) can be slack when there are enough wraps of the line (which actually isn't as many as one would think).

[BillyBob58]

I can definitely understand that, and I've hung over rocks before as well but not sharp ones that would cause me to have a life threatening injury. To each their own, but I'll sleep on the ground before I hang over something that could potentially kill me, regardless of what suspension I'm using.

I'm with you if it is that dangerous, and scary looking trees will make me do that also, or at least keep searching for more safety. I have more than once placed my pack and/or pads over things that were under the hammock, hoping to lessen the damage if the worst happens. And if I have the option, I also put the foot end over the worst looking objects .

[TheIrishmanHangeth]

I'm curious, so what are you using for your "Life and Death" suspension? Surely it must be 1" amsteel (or bigger) as your life is depending on you not falling to your death from the snap of your hammock suspension. Surely one wouldn't trust their "Life" to 7/64th amsteel? Would they? Or even worse Dynaglide.

How many have had their suspension snap? Have any of you had your suspension snap! Don't remember how many posted that they had it snap?

Whats even worse is that every time a thread like this is started there has to be controversy added and started, other than a discussion on the topic.

I was wondering when you were gonna chime in yoda, seeing as you had the thread about weight ratings in general. A thread I enjoyed by the way, in case you couldn't tell I have the same thought process as you that hammock hanging is not a life or death thing(if it was, we would all be using canvas for our hammock bodies and static climbing rope for our suspensions to ensure no chance of failure regardless of hanging conditions). I'm planing on making a DIY hammock using 1.1 ripstop and dynaglide, even though I'm over 200 pounds. I'll make sure and do my testing over a safe spot and worst case is I find out I'm too fat and switch to a more robust system.

[nothermark]

I'm curious, so what are you using for your "Life and Death" suspension? Surely it must be 1" amsteel (or bigger) as your life is depending on you not falling to your death from the snap of your hammock suspension. Surely one wouldn't trust their "Life" to 7/64th amsteel? Would they? Or even worse Dynaglide.

How many have had their suspension snap? Have any of you had your suspension snap! Don't remember how many posted that they had it snap?

Whats even worse is that every time a thread like this is started there has to be controversy added and started, other than a discussion on the topic.

1/8 in amsteel will give an adequate safety factor. I'd go bigger if I thought I needed it. SilvrSurfr and others already spelled it out for you. We hammock hang to get to use places where a tent is often not reasonable. That means roots and/or rocks underneath. That is why we talk about climbing rated hardware and 5:1 to 10:1 range safety factors. Those are the life threatening range minimums.

There have been a handful of posts about folks falling due to suspension problems. There have also been a lot of comments about everybody falls sooner or later. That seems to indicate most of us have fallen at some point. I know I have. The test stand where I play in the yard has 3 bags of ground tire mulch still in the bags in the drop zone for that reason.

Some of what I have done is also why I bring up issues like this when folks who obviously do not understand the problem try to look at a book or table and figure that a 250 lb person must be OK in a hammock suspended with 1000 lb line. That really tells me two things. First is that they do not really understand the complex loads they are dealing with. Second, that they will end up on the ground sooner or later. Probably sooner and at a very inconvenient time.

[OldRagFreeze]

All of this is great, but my question is what do I stand to save in weight by going to Dynaglide over Amsteel 7/64? Ounces? Grams?

[BillyBob58]

1/8 in amsteel will give an adequate safety factor. I'd go bigger if I thought I needed it. SilvrSurfr and others already spelled it out for you. We hammock hang to get to use places where a tent is often not reasonable. That means roots and/or rocks underneath. That is why we talk about climbing rated hardware and 5:1 to 10:1 range safety factors. Those are the life threatening range minimums.

There have been a handful of posts about folks falling due to suspension problems. There have also been a lot of comments about everybody falls sooner or later. That seems to indicate most of us have fallen at some point. I know I have. The test stand where I play in the yard has 3 bags of ground tire mulch still in the bags in the drop zone for that reason.

Some of what I have done is also why I bring up issues like this when folks who obviously do not understand the problem try to look at a book or table and figure that a 250 lb person must be OK in a hammock suspended with 1000 lb line. That really tells me two things. First is that they do not really understand the complex loads they are dealing with. Second, that they will end up on the ground sooner or later. Probably sooner and at a very inconvenient time.

One guy ( can't remember who) fell either from the suspension or hammock material failure, again can't remember for sure. What I do remember is that like I often do, he was using a Vario hammock stand, and crunched his tail bone on that ground level center bar, which caused him quite a bit of misery. There have been other falls either from suspension or fabric failure.

I do not remember yet having a suspension snap, and I am still even using my stock Claytor kind of thin nylon(?) webbing from 5+ years ago, and my stock HH from 6+ years ago, and others. I have had a poorly cinched up cinch buckle lower me some what quickly to the ground, abrading the yellow Harbor Freight straps, but I am still using them, buckle and straps.

My closest call by far was hanging with some nasty Idaho rocks just off to the side of my hammock, about the best spot I could find where there were no widow makers threatening me. Nothing failed except my brain. Returning to my Claytor/Pea Pod after getting up for a pee brake in the middle of the night, I sat down in my hammock- NOT. I mistook the back edge of my Pea Pod for the back edge of my hammock, and sat down with both edges of the hammock touching each other, and flipped right over on my back. I did not have an injury worth mentioning, but just a few inches from my right shoulder were those rocks. Rocks that were far enough to the side of my hammock that I would never have hit them if my hammock failed while I was laying in it. But if I had fallen on them when I flipped out of the hammock, instead of missing by inches, I would have been in bad shape. But, that has nothing to do with suspensions, so OT I guess.