How To Coil A Hose

Now what?

Previously I talked about how to coil a line, using a figure-8 pattern in order to avoid imparting twist...  twist that would cause problems when the line is taken off the coil.

Well, that same problem also exists with stiffer things, like hoses.  Except that (sticking with hose) a figure-8 coiling pattern really doesn't work very well.  

In a couple of pictures, here's how to coil a hose without adding twist:

Put the first turn of the hose on the bracket in the usual way.  This puts a half-twist into the hose.

But for the second turn, instead put a REVERSE twist into it, making the free end come out UNDER the turn instead of over it, cancelling out the twist imparted by the previous turn.  The first time you do this it will feel awkward.  But after the tenth time, it will feel completely natural.

Just alternate regular turns and reverse turns for the rest of the length of the hose.

You'll end up with a neat coil, and more importantly, one that has no twist in it so that when you pay it off of the bracket, you won't have kinks appearing.

This works just as well for other things too, like a heavy extension cord, for example.  But here is a caution: when both ends are free, it is all too easy to withdraw an end from the the wrong side of the coil when unwinding it.  If you do this, instead of a twist-free line, you'll get a whole series of overhand knots.  Of course, with a hose that stays attached to the hose bib, it is difficult (but not impossible...) to make this happen.

How To Coil A Hose

Marlinspike seamanship

So you consider yourself to be a real salty sailor. You've studied Ashley's Book of Knots and have hundreds of the knots illustrated there memorized. You can even do that thrown bowline.  You don't have to look at the instructions to do an eye splice on double braid line.  Yup, you're a real marlinspike sailor.

Well then, here's a challenge for you, Salty:  Tie a knot that you can slide your foot into.  You won't find this in Ashley's.  But Jane is doing one right now:

Not in Ashley's

Not only is she doing it, but she's doing it in miniature, twice - these are destined for our 2 year-old granddaughter's feet...

Each of these is a single knot

Marlinspike seamanship

Clumsiness Redeemed

I have sung the praises of Brion Toss' splicing wand before, so I won't repeat that here.  Of course I have one.  But sadly, I am a clumsy oaf.

Sheath, inner brass rod, and snare at the tip of the rod.

For those of you that don't have one of these (why not?), the tool is comprised of a plastic handle, a brass inner rod embedded firmly in the handle, a "snare" made of very thin line that is inserted into the tip of the rod, and a stainless sheath that fits over the rod and snare.  To use, you would slide the sheath out far enough to hide the snare and then you'd tighten the thumbscrew.  Then you'd thread the needle part into the rope and back out at the designated spot.  Loosen the thumbscrew and retract the sheath, exposing the snare.  Trap the end of the portion that needs to be pulled back thru the rope in the snare, extend the sheath far enough so that the rope end is held tightly in the snare, and then withdraw the needle from the rope.  If you've spliced double braid, you can visualize what I am saying.

Now here's my mistake: I picked the tool up by the "needle" part instead of the handle.  This would have been OK except that I hadn't tightened the thumbscrew.  As a consequence, the stainless sheath - the part I was holding - slid right off of the brass rod, leaving me holding just the sheath.  The rest of the tool fell to the cabin sole, hard.  When I picked it up, I found that the tip of the brass rod had broken off, ruining the tool.

I was dismayed.  Splicing wands are not cheap, and no replacement parts are available.

But then I realized that this was an opportunity for another zero-cost experiment!  Attempting to repair the tool would cost nothing.  Ah, but if it succeeded!

Now having a good workshop is a critical part of this - I don't think you could do this with hand tools, at least the third step anyway.  Here's what I did:

• I ground off the ruined end of the brass rod, back to straight unbent metal.  With the broken off end, this meant that I had lost about 1/2" of length of the rod.  This is not critical - if necessary, I could just make a longer snare.
• Center punched the end of the rod.  I really wanted to get this in the very center of the rod - it's only 1/8" in diameter and I could tolerate only a little eccentricity.
• Mounted the rod in my drill press vice vertically, extending it from beneath the table up into the vice.
• Drill a 1/16" pilot hole 1/2" deep in the end of the rod.  Pause and withdraw the bit frequently to clear chips.
• Over drill with a 5/64" bit.
• Now using a Dremmel tool with a small grinding bit, cut away enough of the sidewall to expose the drilled channel and to make a relief cavity for the knot at the end of the snare.  Of course I didn't get the hole exactly in the center (tho it was awfully close...), so I chose the thinner side to cut away,  leaving more meat on the other side.  In fact, I had a lot more meat than the original tip had. 

Sorry it's blurry - my phone camera won't focus this close

Finished, snare installed

The experiment succeeded! For the cost of about 20 minutes delicate work (I'm not counting the cost of the shop or the tools, because: He who dies with the most tools wins...), I got a new splicing wand, saving myself $65 plus tax and shipping.  And because I've got more meat up there in the tip, the tool is sturdier than a factory one.

Clumsiness Redeemed

The Right Tool For The Job

If you're on a modern boat (and maybe even if you're not...), your running rigging is probably double braid line.  And the chances are excellent that that each length of that double braid has an eye splice at one end.  So here's the Big Question:

Have you ever made an eye splice in double braid?

I have made lots of them, and therefore can offer this advice to you:  This is one of those jobs for which having the right tool makes all the difference.

First easy eye splice

Up until the eye splice above, I had used a small tool set that I got at West Marine.  I chose it primarily because it was inexpensive.  And I made a lot of splices with it.  None were easy.  The directions were confusing (actually, I'm convinced they were flat wrong), and the tool was less than inadequate.  But I got the splices made with the help of lots of beer, the mariner's task lubricant.

If you've ever attempted an eye splice in old line, you will know that it is nearly impossible.  The line is stiff, is loaded with dried algae and salt, and has lost the lubricant the factory applies during it's construction.

And yet, I made the splice above in old line (actually some old 3/8" Stayset that used to run our furler).  And I can say that this was the easiest eye splice I have ever made, bar none.  Old line or new.

Why?

Because I had the right tool for the job.

And what tool, pray tell, is that?

The right tool for splicing braided line

The right tool for splicing double braid is Brion Toss's Splicing Wand.  We picked one up when we made a pilgrimage to Brion Toss's rigging shop in Port Townsend, but you can order them online too.

Splicing with this tool is nothing like using my old ones.  How do I make the comparison?   Let's try this:  splicing double braid without this tool is like cutting a board with a hammer and a screw driver.  You can do it, but it takes a lot longer, is a lot more work, and leaves you with a sub-optimal result.

The working end

This is one of those devices that is so ingenious and yet so simple that you will wonder why it took so long for someone to think it up.  How does it work?  Brion's description says it best:

The Splicing Wand is basically a long tube containing a hidden snare.  You slide the tool into the rope, grab the end you want to tuck, and slide the tool out.  There's a specially-shaped tip on the tube, to keep you from snagging yarns along the way, an ingenious mechanism in the handle, to hold the tube in place while you work.  You can clamp the tool in a vise if you want, leaving both hands free to deal with the rope, there's no taping or un-taping, no fid lengths to decipher, and very little physical effort needed to tuck.

 If you have double braid line on your boat, you need this tool.  I'll say it again:  Using Brion's tool, splicing old line was far easier than splicing new line was with my old tools.  I don't think I can say it any better than that.

Why don't you have one?

The Right Tool For The Job

Near miss

New jib halyard

This morning, as soon as I had downed the obligatory two lattes, I set to work splicing a new snap shackle onto the end of our jib halyard.  You see, ever since we bought Eolian, that shackle has been a problem.  The retainer is off of the retaining pin, and therefore the only thing actually holding the pin in place (and the shackle closed) is some wraps of electrical tape.  No bueno.

So.  Since we had to take the jib off for our haulout this coming Friday (the yard does not allow roller furling jibs - apparently one came unfurled in the past and set off a game of dominos), I thought this morning would be a great time to replace the shackle.  After all, it was a beautiful, warm morning - the nicest of the year so far.

But when Jane came back to the boat after doing some errands, I had spent more than two hours trying to splice a new shackle into that old line.  Note to self:  never, NEVER try to splice old line.  And she was ready to take the boat out for the first day of the year.  And instead of being ready, I was frustrated.

So I made a trip to West Marine and bought 104' of 1/2" line and replaced the halyard.  And as it turns out, it's a good thing I did - the old line was badly chafed - in one spot the cover was gone and the core was badly worn.  So now, with the things that remain to be done to cast off the lines, we won't make it off the dock.

Does this count as chips into the Black Box?  I hadn't originally intended to replace the halyard...  

So our first trip of the year will still be the short one - over to Seaview West for the haulout.

Rats.

Near miss

How to: Coil a line

There may be as many ways of coiling up a line for storage as there are sailors on the planet.

But the real pros at this were the old-time whalers - the ones who went out in the small boats with little more than a harpoon and a lot of line.  When they speared a whale and the beast took off, it was critical, no, crucial, that the coil of line in the front of the boat payed out cleanly - their lives depended on it.  For if it didn't, if the harpoon line suddenly turned into a giant Gordian knot as it payed out, the whalers in the boat were doomed.

So how did they store the line in the bow of their boats?  No, not as a coil.  For when a line is coiled into a stack of circular turns, it is necessary to put one twist in the line for each turn to make it lay flat.  When the line is then removed from the coil, those twists pile up and eventually collect into a huge mess of a knot.

Instead, the whalers flaked the line into the bows of the whale boats.  Flaking a line "coils" it without adding twists.  Here's how to do it in hand:

If one end of the line is fixed, start near that end.  Grasp the line in one hand and then with the other hand reach out a distance and grasp the line again.  The distance apart determines the size of the eventual flaked coil.  (If the distance is the full arm-spread of an adult male, it will be approximately 6 feet - the origin of the fathom, as useful now as it was then for quickly measuring the length of a line.)

Bring your hands together and transfer the line to the hand near the fixed end.  But here's the trick:  Do NOT add that twist which would be required to form a circle of the line.  Instead, resist that idea.  Done properly, instead of a circle, you'll have a figure 8 in your hand.

Repeat until you are near the end.  Since we are not going to attach the bitter end to a harpoon, we'll use it instead to secure the flaked coil so that it doesn't spill all over the place.

Still holding the coil in your left hand, pass a turn or two around it above the midpoint.

Next, make a loop on the free end and pass it thru the accumulated turns you are holding in your left hand.

Finally, pass the bitter end thru that loop and snug it up.

This secures the coil and keeps it from getting tangled, and it provides a nice tail to clove hitch to a nearby rail to store the line.

As an alternative, if you don't need the tail for hanging the line, you may pass that loop thru the accumulated turns in your hand, and then simply pull it down over the collection of turns, locking everything in place, like what was done with this length of shiny new line destined to become replacement docklines on Eolian.

Finally as another alternative which is particularly useful if you are coiling a line which will be hung from a cleat but which must be ready to release, skip making the turns around the coil and use up all the line in making figure 8's.  Now pass a loop from the standing end thru the coils in your left hand, give it a twist or two and then hang that loop from the upper horn of the cleat.

What all of these methods have in common is the use of figure 8 flaking instead of coiling the line in circles. (There is a way to coil a line into circles with every other turn going in the opposite direction so the twists cancel out, but that's a story for another time.) 

Figure 8's are your friend.

How to: Coil a line