My first homade hammock

[NCPatrick]

Looks pretty comfortable, until somebody tries to park the car in the garage... I hope they see you in time...

[Youngblood]

Youngblood, Do you have a 12 footer?

Yes... sort off. I have one that is made out of a twelve foot piece of 5 foot wide 1.9 oz rip stop nylon with DWR. It is a little over 11 feet as a hammock but I call it a twelve footer because I like the sound of that better. I use it for a backyard hammock... my backpacking hammocks don't seem quite so comfy after I have used it. lol

The stretch of the hammock material plays a big part because one of the things you want is to reduce pressure points by having the material gently caress a wide area along your backside rather than be concentrated at the low points along your backside... you don't want to lay on a flat piece of plywood.

Another thing you will find that will affect the comfort of backpacking hammocks is the width, up to a certain point. There is some solid geometry going on involving the length, width, and sag angle. The width can be more in proportion to the length for a particular sag angle than you can make use of by laying on. Bugnets also can effect the lay of a hammock in that they can introduce a combined girth that restricts how much of a diagonal you can lay comfortable on. In many cases attaching a bugnet makes the hammock feel shorter.

I have a different hammock knot I have used for the last year or so after much prodding from Ralph on the Yahoo Hammock Camping Group... a slippery double sheet bend. I was surprised at how well that simple knot works, I had read in the past where a sheet bend wasn't a strong knot but obviously it depends on what you are tying off to and with what. It holds so well with what I have used for suspension line that I suspect that if you tied the suspension lines between two trucks and stressed tested them that the hammock fabric would rip or a suspension line would break before one of the knots slipped. I have used 3/8" hollow-core braided polypropylene rope and 1" wide polypropylene webbing. You don't depend on hemming the fabric for it to hold, although I still hem the fabric. With the slip loop it is easy to untie and I sometimes do that to play with pulling the edges or center of the hammock without even untying the suspension line from the tree. My best guess is that it uses about 9 inches less fabric overall than Ed's overhand knot for tying both ends of 5 foot wide 1.9 oz RSN. It has a nice overall appearance when the knot is finished too. I don't see any reason to not use that knot, at least for the suspension lines I have used. It is easy enough to try if you are in the process of making a hammock and easy to undo if you decide it isn't for you.

Hammock engineering is fun, interesting, and something we all can do. It doesn't take specialized tools or materials you can't obtain, glad you are enjoying it.

[Mule]

Yes... sort off. I have one that is made out of a twelve foot piece of 5 foot wide 1.9 oz rip stop nylon with DWR. It is a little over 11 feet as a hammock but I call it a twelve footer because I like the sound of that better. I use it for a backyard hammock... my backpacking hammocks don't seem quite so comfy after I have used it. lol

The stretch of the hammock material plays a big part because one of the things you want is to reduce pressure points by having the material gently caress a wide area along your backside rather than be concentrated at the low points along your backside... you don't want to lay on a flat piece of plywood.

Another thing you will find that will affect the comfort of backpacking hammocks is the width, up to a certain point. There is some solid geometry going on involving the length, width, and sag angle. The width can be more in proportion to the length for a particular sag angle than you can make use of by laying on. Bugnets also can effect the lay of a hammock in that they can introduce a combined girth that restricts how much of a diagonal you can lay comfortable on. In many cases attaching a bugnet makes the hammock feel shorter.

I have a different hammock knot I have used for the last year or so after much prodding from Ralph on the Yahoo Hammock Camping Group... a slippery double sheet bend. I was surprised at how well that simple knot works, I had read in the past where a sheet bend wasn't a strong knot but obviously it depends on what you are tying off to and with what. It holds so well with what I have used for suspension line that I suspect that if you tied the suspension lines between two trucks and stressed tested them that the hammock fabric would rip or a suspension line would break before one of the knots slipped. I have used 3/8" hollow-core braided polypropylene rope and 1" wide polypropylene webbing. You don't depend on hemming the fabric for it to hold, although I still hem the fabric. With the slip loop it is easy to untie and I sometimes do that to play with pulling the edges or center of the hammock without even untying the suspension line from the tree. My best guess is that it uses about 9 inches less fabric overall than Ed's overhand knot for tying both ends of 5 foot wide 1.9 oz RSN. It has a nice overall appearance when the knot is finished too. I don't see any reason to not use that knot, at least for the suspension lines I have used. It is easy enough to try if you are in the process of making a hammock and easy to undo if you decide it isn't for you.

Hammock engineering is fun, interesting, and something we all can do. It doesn't take specialized tools or materials you can't obtain, glad you are enjoying it.

Thanks for all the great information. I just took off the whipping and tied it Ed style, it was a cinch, pun. It also lays great, no hard board effect but I can go diagonal and get plenty flat. Much more comfortable in my opinion. I am going to look up the slippery double sheet bend. Now are you saying you use it INSTEAD OF the overhand knot that Ed uses, or just for the suspension?
I am a bit paranoid about knots right now so I am using figure nines on my suspension at the moment. Thanks again, Mule

[Youngblood]

I use it instead of the overhand knot. I use it to attach the hammock suspension line/webbing/rope directly to the hammock. The suspension line is tied in with the hammock material.

You made a bend in the gathered hammock material, that is the first step in a double sheet bend. Next you wrap the suspension line in around that bend in a double sheet bend, leaving a loop in the last wrap to make it slippery, or easy to untie.

[hangnout]

http://www.cabelas.com/information/c...SheetBend.html

In the link above rope 1 would be suspension line, rope 2 is the hammock

[traviso71]

What is the difference between tying the whipping Speer style vs HH style?

[headchange4u]

That's a big hammock!

Congrats of your first hammock (There will be more, I promise ). Looks great.

[tight-wad]

You made a bend in the gathered hammock material, that is the first step in a double sheet bend. Next you wrap the suspension line in around that bend in a double sheet bend, leaving a loop in the last wrap to make it slippery, or easy to untie.

When you make the bend in the hammock fabric, do you pull out both sides to make them shorter, then make the bend? If so, about how much do you pull out on each side? 2 inches? more?

[Youngblood]

http://www.cabelas.com/information/c...SheetBend.html

In the link above rope 1 would be suspension line, rope 2 is the hammock

That is right but that is a regular sheet bend instead of a slippery sheet bend. You may not be able to untie that one if you fully tension it.

To make it slippery, the part of the wrapping in step 5 is done a little differently. Instead of passing the whole end of the rope through, you just pass a loop of it through. That way, after it is tensioned it will release when you pull on the slipped, or looped end. Kind of like tying and untying your shoes, you leave a loop so you can pull on it to release the knot.

[tight-wad]

.. different methods WBG had one .... then pull it tight... then all you need to do is pull out the long ends.

Pull the string tight? ?Make the string tight, then squench up all the fabric on the string as tight as you can leaving many inches of string on each end? Then do the pulling out of the sides?