Sqidmark's Tree Belt for Two

[sqidmark]

I'll post a pic of the celtic shackle.

I'll also try to draw a pic of what I was thinking with the toggle.. but now that you mention the behavior with only one hammock weighted, which I didn't consider, two of my ideas might have blown out of the water..

With lots of practice, perhaps carefully synchronised mounting/dismounting?

[sqidmark]

Minor update.

I ordered one of the ss ladder locks from Sailrite. This is to replace just the main buckle. The 3000lb webbing fits 'perfectly'. So far I've only tried it as a make-shift setup in the house for a single Ridgerunner. No slippage at all for two consecutive nights. It seems to bite a lot tighter than I was expecting. Of course this does not mean it's going to work well for my intended use. Sometime over the weekend I'm hoping I can get it outside to try with two loaded hammocks. This tool is many times easier/quicker to implement than passing 3 layers of webbing through a single slot of the multibuckle.

I haven't put the ladder lock on the scale yet, but is a substantial piece of hardware. I can already hear the gram weenies screaming "blasphemy!" at the top of their lungs. I'm pretty sure you could hang a truck from it without worry of breaking it. I'd also place bets on it surviving being run over by an Abrams. Sailrite gives it a 500lb rating, which I suspect has to do with slippage.

I'm reserving any further judgements till I get it out on the tree and 'fully' weighted. Mrs. sqid and I will not even come close to testing the 500lb limit though, but maybe with the 3 kids and the dog...

While I certainly wouldn't advocate use of this ladder lock for backpacking, it may turn out to work well enough for car camping. My fingers are crossed for some titanium engineering gawd to rescue this little project from the depths of obscurity by designing/producing some super light bling bits.

[sqidmark]

I cut the sailrite buckle and drilled a 3/8 hole in the tab end. Before = 36g. After 28g. On my scale, drilling the hole made no difference, 28g before and after. I suppose I could have weighed it on my reloading scale, but really, a grain weenie?

I suspect that cutting the one end off may have been a mistake. I think it tended to force the other end with the teeth down into the webbing better. It may not make a significant difference in this application though, being as it's wrapped around a tree.



Finished overall length is now 9'8". The strap with one modified sailrite buckle, two multi-buckles, two 7/64 celtic shackles and two 4" continuous loops of 2.2 kevlar weigh in at 5.7oz. Of course this strap is way too long for backpacking. I haven't yet spent the time to come up with an equivilent two hugger/strap for weight comparison.

[Dutch]

Have you considered my new daisy chain webbing for this. you can pull it through it's own loop and clip to that end and then clip to the loop on the other side of the tree. It is strong enough with 5000 overall breaking strength and 2000 per loop.

[sqidmark]

Funny you should mention that as I was thinking of it just yesterday, but I hadn't looked up the specs yet. I was concerned about so many sewn loops. I forgot that it's woven. Looks to be a whole lot less hassle with a lot less hardware. Should wind up about the same weight, assuming using a nano 22. I don't have one of your Dutch Biners, would they work well for this? Although, I'd expect a 1/8 amsteel celtic shackle would also be sufficient.

I'll order some of the webbing asap.

Thanks for the reminder. We all need a slap upside the head from time to time!

[Dutch]

It would be hard to fit the webbing in the Dutch Biner. It can be done but it isn't practical. You could use your soft shackle or you could put a whoopie hook or dutch biner on a loop and larks head it on the desired loop. Really the one on the end you pull through would just stay on. The only one that really needs to move is the one on tho opposite side of the tree.

[sqidmark]

Just out of curiosity, what is the pitch between loops? Looking at the photo on your site, I'm guessing roughly 4" when laid flat.

Will be ordering this morning, just deciding on how much I want.

[Dutch]

it is 3 inches

[sqidmark]

Great, even better. Thanks. I've got 34ft plus other stuff in my cart but it'll have to wait for funds transfer tomorrow.

[sqidmark]

Got the daisy chain yesterday afternoon. I tried it last night indoors with my Ridgerunner. I didn't die.

First I tried doing as Dutch suggested by simply pulling it through the end loop in the usual manner. However, this won't/can't work if ya think about it. Suppose the first hammock to be weighted is the one on the far side of the tree, it will naturally loosen the strap with imminent failure. Even if the far side waits for the connecting side to get in first, what happens when connecting side needs to get up for a 2am break?

Maybe I'm overlooking something?

The strap/hugger will have to be connected in a way that it can't pull through or loosen. To me this means a biner or shackle.

The celtic shackle on the far right is too far out because it will have such a strong tendency to pull toward the center. Always have to think about the effect of only one hammock being loaded. Just for clarity, the shackles pass through the daisy chain loops, thus eliminating the need for the buckles in my first set up. This is a 7' hugger btw and I have a whole two loops to spare. Of course it's not as far up the tree as it would be if I were actually going to hang from it.


The nano 22 is fine for car camping or back yard, but not really something I want to backpack with x2. It's not so heavy, but much bulkier than the shackles. The connection doesn't have to be made this close to the front of the tree, it can be on the side or around the back. I made it here simply for convenience during this setup.


Here is a 1/8 celtic shackle without the button knot. I'd have to make it about 50% longer for this use. Tacblades says that I could probably get away using 7/64 but in the improved soft shackle configuration, not the celtic. I may just go ahead and make a couple of longer 1/8 celtics, just for the extra safety margin.


What you see here is a celtic stretch shackle made of 1/8 shock cord. It's a diamond lanyard with 550 celtic button slider. It works exactly like the celtic shackle. My idea is to take the slack out while there is little to no load thus preventing sliding down the tree. It acutally works quite well. 3/32 or maybe even 1/16 should be all that's needed though.


So far it appears that the daisy chain is going to be a winner for this application. I expect it won't take me too long to fine tune this into exactly what I want. Thanks Dutch!