What is the easiest way to secure tarp

**Richard Tipton** · 10-29-2013, 06:38

I use 200# planer board line and it'll hold any knot(or splice) you throw at it but my guyouts are 6' whoopies made with the stuff. they work great but I think a taut line hitch would be more useful. You could untie it and retie around a root, branch or whatever. Kinda hard to do that with a whoopie. Think I'll redo my guyouts this weekend.

**Seeker** · 10-31-2013, 20:45

Not really sure what you mean as far as difficulty, but I'll just explain how I do my tarp and lines. I have a Hennessy and use either the stock diamond tarp or the OES McCat Standard.

The stock tarp clips to the ridge line and the two remaining tie-outs get tied to nearby bushes OR I tie a tautline hitch and run them down to stakes. Sometimes, I raise one of them to increase airflow (I'm in LA, and it gets friggin' HOT.) In this case, I tie a clove hitch to tie the line to the top of my hiking staff (or a stick), and then just do the tautline hitch to a stake.

With the McCat, it's not much different. For those who don't know, it's a catenary hex. I have about 6' of line tied to the 2 points that tie out to the trees. I try to get my hanging trees about 15'-17' apart, which means I've got about 2'-3' of space to bridge at each end... I simply loop the line around the tree once, and then tie a slip knot around itself. Holds in the worst wind, but releases with the pull of the free end.

The other 4 tie-outs are a little more complicated. I try to set up the same way every time, with the head end to my right as I'm looking at it... the 'far side' in this setup is always tied out close to the ground. So those tieouts are only about 4' long, and have tautlines in the ends. The near side tieouts are longer, allowing me to make a 'porch'. The left-hand one is about 12' long, and roughly 6' of it is reflective line. I can tie it out to a convenient tree/bush, or tautline it to a stake. This line always gets tied 'high' to my hiking staff or a stick as described earlier. The other one is about 8' long and just gets staked with a tautline.

I use the tautline because it's easy to tie, creates a moveable knot, shakes out quickly if I don't need it (like to tie to a bush), and it's only one knot to learn (which I learned about 40 years ago in Boy Scouts.)

While I'm at it, i'll explain line-management. A few years back, I was suddenly inspired to make a triangular pocket in the two corners of my diamond tarp so I could roll up the tie-out and stick it in the pocket. When I got the McCat, I needed more help. So I "borrowed" 6 of my daughter's pony-tail holders... 4 black, one red, one blue. The red marked the head end, the blue marked the shoe/foot end, and the black ones were used for the four outside corners. I simply worked the elastic into the knot holding the tieout to the tarp, then coiled it up and wrapped the elastic around it... so all my lines are kept neatly in place and don't get all tangled up.

Hope that helps you out some.

If you had to learn just 5 knots, they should be the square knot, clove hitch, tautline, bowline, and trucker's hitch. With just these, you can do just about anything.

**Bic** · 11-01-2013, 22:28

just did a quick video showing the two methods I use....

**Gristlehead** · 11-04-2013, 11:08

Knots, nots, and more knots.... For me as a Scout Master I try and use the knots I teach. For a scout of 11 years old he is required to learn the Two Half Hitches and Taught line hitch knots. I follow that up with a Truckers Hitch. With these three knots and the addition of a bowline a man can survive life.

Learning knots, has and always will be a mental stumbling block for man. We all learn differently. Simply reading a book and looking at a two dimensional drawing may not work for you with your knots. I am in this category. When I was thrust into being a Scout Master I knew that I was not only going to have to learn, but teach how to tie many knots. I read books, but my best findings where the instructional videos found here.

When setting up my tarp I use a two half hitches knot to secure my tarp ridge line to one of my trees. I use a truckers Hitch to secure the other end of my Tarp Ridge line, and I use the slippery fashion with the tail pull through the loop for safety. On my guy outs I use the two half hitches knot to secure the line to my tarp. I use the Taught line hitch to secure to the stake.

The bowline knot that I mentioned above. Every Man woman and child should know how to tie this knot. Why? It is a knot that creates a loop that will not constrict when force is applied to either end. This loop is ideal for being placed about the body for rescue. I watched in horror as a man was plucked from a ragging river by a helicopter with a rope many years ago. He grabbed a hold of the rope and held on for dear life. He fell to his death. Had he known how to tie a simple bowline he would be alive today.

**Spurr** · 11-04-2013, 12:40

I do simple well in life and try to carry it over into camping..I do knot do knots well and really never took an interest in learning any besides the over hand. To that I rig my tarp ridge line with 1.75 zing it which I knot to each tarp end loop. I then loop it around the tree on each end and secure it with a Nite Ize figure nine. I also do basically the same with my guy lines using Figure Nines to adjust the tension. I'm a Noob and may find I need to upgrade at some point but for now this is simple and gets me into the woods..