Max weight recommendations: how accurate are they? And can I exceed them by 20lbs ?

[arooni]

Hi folks:

I ended up getting a hennessy hammock deep jungle xl hammock. It says that there is a weight limit of 300 pounds. I'm 180-190 depending on the day. I'm wondering if this this would break if I put a girl (on occasion) who would be around 110-130 pounds in the hammock with me. So we'd be looking at (worst case): 190 + 130 = 320 pounds.

Are these things generally engineered to handle a bit over weight spec or am I looking at fabric ripping etc the moment I exceed weight spec?

Thanks1

[jmsdgrf]

You should be alright, assuming you and this girl like to be close, really close. I would think in a situation like this you should be more concerned about comfort. Will you be comfortable with another occupant in the hammock with you? I think HH overbuilds some of their stuff so it's tough enough to handle you. Another thing to keep in mind are the suspension angles, while your hammock might be able to handle the two of you make sure find some sturdy trees because if you set things up "wrong" you could really put a lot of stress on the trees. Double check the book, "The Ultimate Hang" for a chart on hang angles and forces on trees. There might be one floating around here too.

[oldgringo]

I have yet to see a discussion on how these weight limits are derived. My guess is, they are empirically informed WAGs. Give it a try, and add to the data base.

[backroad]

You can exceed the weight limit on a truck a little and still get down a flat smooth road. However if the road has some good bumps you could break your suspension real easy.

I say go for it. Hang it low over soft ground..........o~`o

[Bubba]

I think the weight limits are partly there for legal reasons. Given that cottage vendors would not put out an unsafe product I think the actual failure weight of the materials is very high. Here's Brandon from Warbonnet's post about weight rating from another thread.

If by "tested" you mean that's the breaking strength, then those numbers are not a-typical, most companies do not list a breaking strength for their hammocks but if they did, i'd expect any nylon fabric in that weight range to be at-least that strength if not alot more, i've loaded a brand new single 1.1 blackbird with almost 1200 lbs before failure occured, and all that weight was on only about a 16" wide strip of fabric, so 900 lbs breaking strength for a fabric in the 2.5-3oz range doesn't mean the fabric is any stronger than normal. in general the weave has very little to do with strength, more important factors are the type of nylon, it's threadcount and the fabric weight, special weave not as much.

[arooni]

What about bouncing around while in the hammock. You don't think the material would just snap?

[Rain Man]

What about bouncing around while in the hammock. You don't think the material would just snap?

The two of you stand on some bathroom scales together and "bounce around" and see what your total effective weight peaks at. It might amaze you.

Static weight and dynamic weight are two very different values and either will break the weakest link of a suspension.

You got some very good advice earlier: hang low over soft ground. There are lots of reports on here of things "just snapping" with solo hammockers not over the weight limits.

Be safe.

Rain Man

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[arooni]

Maybe I'll rethink this bouncing idea...

[Gw812]

Maybe I'll rethink this bouncing idea...

If you're thinking about doing what I think you're thinking about doing, only one of you has to be in the hammock. A set of Atlas straps will make it easy to adjust to a 'comfortable height'...