Splicing 102 - Tachyon and Bandit/Blaze

[canopyboy]

Home sick the last two days, and got dead bored. Splicing was something I could do while resting and watching movies. Decided to splice my new climb line - Yale Bandit. Back to that whole hitchclimber thing.

I used to think Velocity was tough to bury the crossover. Then I realized it was easy compared to Tachyon. My new champ for the most difficult double braid to bury is Bandit/Blaze.

I eventually gave up on my old method(s), and tried something one of y'all mentioned in an old post -- use a friction hitch to milk the outer braid back down and bury the crossover. Still had to work like hell at it, but it came out nice, and worked where my old ways failed. Turns out the best was a 3/1 beeline prusik.

Nice thing about doing your own, is you can make it tight enough that it doesn't slide around on the biner. Yeah, they loosen up a little over time and that biner will eventually not stand up, but it still stays put when you're climbing.

I was happy enough I tried it on the end of my old Tachyon as well. It's seen a fair amount of use over the last almost two years. Old used rope is a pain in the :censored:, but I figured this new friction hitch idea just might work. And I'll be damned if it didn't come out purdy.

Sorry about the quality of the cell phone pics, didn't feel like digging out a real camera.

 

[moray]

The Bandit tight eye looks really nice. I think it is not only a pretty tough rope in which to do a dbl-braid splice, but it is even worse when you make a tight eye instead of a much bigger one.

I discovered a trick the other day when I respliced a 2-yr old eye-and-eye made of Samson Ice Tail. I wanted it shorter, and I wanted to get rid of the locked Brummels, so I had to do both eyes. The second one stopped me cold when I was nearly done pulling the bury through. With about 2 inches to go, it totally locked up. No amount of twisting and bending and hauling and verbal abuse made any difference.

Suddenly this idea came into my head: do it under water. Not me, the rope. I put about 4 inches of warm water in the sink, submerged the whole affair, and resumed my efforts. After just a few seconds I could feel the splice softening up. A few seconds more, with only modest effort, and the bury pulled through.

Could this be applied to a double-braid splice? It would be worth a try.

 

[RacerX]

Nice job. Why is it so cold in your house?

 

[mndlawn]

nice job. Why is it so cold in your house?

lol

 

[canopyboy]

Nice job. Why is it so cold in your house?

What can I say, I'm a cheap bastard...

Actually that's the basement thermostat. I see no reason to keep it any warmer down there. Although at night the rest of the house goes that low as well.

 

[canopyboy]

The Bandit tight eye looks really nice. I think it is not only a pretty tough rope in which to do a dbl-braid splice, but it is even worse when you make a tight eye instead of a much bigger one.

I discovered a trick the other day when I respliced a 2-yr old eye-and-eye made of Samson Ice Tail. I wanted it shorter, and I wanted to get rid of the locked Brummels, so I had to do both eyes. The second one stopped me cold when I was nearly done pulling the bury through. With about 2 inches to go, it totally locked up. No amount of twisting and bending and hauling and verbal abuse made any difference.

Suddenly this idea came into my head: do it under water. Not me, the rope. I put about 4 inches of warm water in the sink, submerged the whole affair, and resumed my efforts. After just a few seconds I could feel the splice softening up. A few seconds more, with only modest effort, and the bury pulled through.

Could this be applied to a double-braid splice? It would be worth a try.

I've found soaking in warm water to help a bit, although I've never actually tried doing it underwater. I don't think it would help so much that I wouldn't still need to put a good solid pull on it, and not sure how to to accomplish that in a bucket.

:jester:

 

[moray]

... not sure how to to accomplish that in a bucket.

Me neither. But maybe when the splice is thoroughly soaking wet you could take it out of the bucket and hook it back up to your pulling rig for the final pull. There should be some way to make this work.

 

[canopyboy]

But maybe when the splice is thoroughly soaking wet you could take it out of the bucket and hook it back up to your pulling rig for the final pull.

Yup, that's already in the play book.

Actually, you should have seen how much brown water squeezed out of the rope when I started pulling the friction hitch down the tachyon. And I thought the rope was fairly clean. Seems like I had washed it not that long ago.