Bad news, though: now I've gotta build 3 more! (one for the wife, and one for each of my daughters!) :laugh:
I bought 4yds of 1.9oz ripstop, 50ft of 7/64 amsteel, and a spool of the tex50 thread, and a pair of the 1100lb biners from DIYgear. I have none of the amsteel, a lot of the thread and a nice sized scrap of the nylon left.
First adventure with the amsteel rope: very nice stuff, wasn't too bad to splice: I couldn't find my old sets of guitar strings, so I used some 0.025 solid core welding wire from my MIG to do the splicing with. Worked pretty well, but I had to tape the end so it wouldn't get caught, and the tape left sticky residue which means the splicing tool gets cut back or thrown away.
I made 3 whoopie slings, and a bracelet. The bracelet was for learning to splice, and I'll explain the third whoopie sling in a minute. I used some of the tex50 thread to lock the bury in place on the fixed eye loops.
http://bd.zenbsd.net/~jontow/phone/h...-10-40_682.jpg
I ended up using a very small piece of my leftover nylon and an old boot lace to make a stuff sack.
http://bd.zenbsd.net/~jontow/phone/h...-11-36_746.jpg
Didn't buy any tree huggers, as I've got some 2ft (turns out: thats a lot too short) 2000lb webbing straps I use to secure my motorcycle in the truck bed that always go with me anyway.
I used the sticky-thread DIY-gathered-end tutorial for the hammock body and suspension itself, and liked the adjustable ridgeline idea; that is, the one that just slips over the suspension. If I was in a place where I couldn't find trees close enough together, I could remove the ridgeline and gain a bit of length.
http://bd.zenbsd.net/~jontow/phone/h...-11-02_240.jpg
Now, to explain the third whoopie: I'm a bit fan of having multiple purpose items on hand, and having a spare whoopie sling means if I screw up and somehow manage to damage one of the suspension lines, I can just remove my ridgeline and swap it on. It also after a few test hangs seems to be a fine ridgeline.
Hangs pretty well for a first shot:
http://bd.zenbsd.net/~jontow/phone/h...-10-11_327.jpg
While the kids were napping, I cloth-welded up a ridgeline bag, too:
http://bd.zenbsd.net/~jontow/phone/h...-11-09_878.jpg
Any ideas on how much length I should use to make kid hammocks? I'm thinking 2.5yds is enough: the girls are 6 and 3, and both on the petite side. If I use a full 2.5yds for each, I think they'll have enough room to grow for a few years?
Thanks for all the great info!