Yesterday I finished making my first DIY hammock, I have 4 other professionally made hammocks. I followed the tutorial on here and made a whipped end. The end itself looks very similar to how my WBBB looks so I think I did that part right. I put my continuous loop around it and put in my ridgeline. I set it up in the garage and was very impressed with myself. It is huge, 12 foot long and 69 inches wide after hemming. It felt great. I did not notice any calf ridge. I have a WBBB XLC and while I generally like it, the calf ridge has been a bit annoying. I could just imagine the great sleep I would have on my next trip.
Today, I took it outside and put it between some real trees with my other hammock next to it for a comparison. Something was not going right. I could not get comfortable in it despite having a 30 degree angle and what seemed to be the correct stress on the ridgeline. I noticed that the ends were twisted a bit and could tell that was effecting how much slack was on the sides. I tried moving my continuous loop larkshead around to see if that would help. Next I got back in the hammock and tried repositioning and then the hammock tore about a 10 inch opening near one of the ends. Now I am not so impressed with myself. I'm not entirely sure why it tore. I'm not huge, only 180 pounds, but clearly something was not right with how I had the ends put together. Before it tore, the main issue was the sides were pretty floppy and they were not able to give my head support. The fabric was 1.6 HyperD XL and should be strong enough for me.
So, I am going to try again. Perhaps I should try a channel end and just put the continuous loop through that. My question is, is it easier to get the proper lay in a hammock with different ways of doing the end? Also if anyone can think of what I did wrong so I do not do it again, that would be great.
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