I have been camping (back in my ground-dwelling days) in some cold weather and I never liked breaking camp in the bitter cold. My hands would be numb and the fingers would not cooperate with my brain when it came to untying the knots all over camp. So, I started looking for ways to make my setup knot-free.
With hammock camping it seems to have come much easier and the setup I have working now seems to have accomplished a no-knot setup without loosing the integrity of tight ridge-line or stake chords slipping.
Now, I have slept in a few different hammocks over the past couple of years and although the hammock, the bugnet, and the rain fly do get switched out from time to time, the setup remains the same.
here is my setup with pics.
The Ridge-line for the rain fly:
For my ridge-line I used to tie one end off with a knot and then use a series of knots to make a pulley system and use that to tighten up the ridge-line. The know I used is is called the "Positive knot" and I got the knot from Paco on YouTube:
I wuold use the knot as a pully and pull the ridge-line tight against the loop and then tie it off. it is time consuming and hard to untie in the cold morning.
so, thanks to Bloomgeorge here in the hammock fourm, I now use the tarp key. I have not used it in the field yet, but my initial tests have been positive.
Hammock Suspension:
I have been using this setup for a while and have had no issues with it.
I use some climbing webbing from REI and I sewed in a loop using some strong nylon thread. Don't use cotton thread in any of your projects as the cotton will eventually rot and you will hit the floor.
The loop holds a soft shackle made from 7/64 amsteel. The web is wrapped around the tree and slipped through the soft shackle. The pic here shows the strap wrapped twice, but that is because the pole is slick and I didnt want the hammock slipping while I made the video.
Then the tag end is then looped into a marlin spike hitch and I slip a toggle (I use a stick here that I found on the ground) and that hold my whoopie sling:
So far, no knots at all.
Bug Net:
Not shown in any pictures, is the ENO Guardian. Oh yeah... I will be using the ENO DoubleNest on my next trip. I have not slept in the eno yet but I feel it will be very comfortable.
So, the Guardian has two openings with clips on the top (see the video for details) that clicp onto an extra line that came with the Guardian. I do not use the extra string as I have modified my ENO and added a ridge-line to the hammock and that holds the bug net off of my face without the use of that extra string.
The two ends open and allows you to slide your hammock and suspension through the center of the bug net. the hammock suspension keeps the net off of you and then the two openings synches close with some chord and chord-locks.
There is another chord sewn into the top of the bug net on each end, this ties to the tree to keep the bug net taught on a horizontal plain. Again I do not tie these into a a knot. I use a taught-line hitch and simply loop over the toggle that my hammock suspension whoopie slings is looped over.
Notice the outer-most black chord in this pic here:
That is the chord for the Guardian and it seems to work well.
That is the basics. Once I decide on using a UQ or not, I will work that out to where don't have to mess with any knots as well.
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