Shore School: Splicing Dyneema and How to Make Soft Shackles

Description

Sad that Mashnee is already out of the water? Me too. Join me and fill this gaping hole in your heart by learning some new rope skills! This class will cover the basics of splicing Dyneema. While Dyneema is ridiculously strong, tying knots in the material causes dramatic reductions in breaking strength, even more than regular polyester rope (D12 is dyneema, doublebraid is normal ployester). Splicing provides a way of creating complex structures like eyes, loops, and tapers which retain nearly 100% of the rated strength of the line.

We'll cover the basics of cutting, splicing, and tapering dyneema, as well as tying one of the few knots which does work well in the material: the diamond knot. After we're comfortable with each of these fundamentals, we'll put them together and make soft shackles. The goal is that each person will make at least two soft shackles: one which goes to Mashnee, and one for to keep for themselves!

This class will be held at the MIT pavilion, in the shore school classroom.

Class size will be limited to ~8, based on the number of splicing tools we have. If you're really into it and buy your own splicing tools, you can join past this limit (email me, I'll tell you what's required).

Disclaimer: This will be my first time teaching the class, so I'll also be learning as we go. We may or may not finish within the allotted two hours. Scheduled time subject to change. I'll and confirm entries by the preceeding Thursday night.

Organizers

Questions about this event should be directed to the organizer(s): GAVIN WEST