I went out and bought quite a bit of the dyneema today. I got some 4mm covered dyneema for my lazyjacks, some 5mm for my lifelines, some 6mm bare because it looked good and 40m of 8mm because I might replace the Dux on the trailer sailer but probably I will throw it in the bilge of the 38ft cat for any emegency rigging repairs when we go cruising next year - I love the idea of having enough rope to get myself out of trouble if some wire starts going dodgy.At those prices for SK78 it was very hard to resist - I was thinking about going bigger on the lifelines but we have used polyester covered 5 mm for about 10 years so far and it has worked well. It has a breaking strength of 1200kg should be fine.
They even have 8 and 10mm polyester covered dyneema for those who want to renew yacht control lines and sheets.
Select to expand quotejulesmoto said..Ramona said..
With 3 and 4mm dyneena if you don't want to use a bowline a figure 8 loop saturated with epoxy would be a good alternative. Just a straight figure of 8 loop in 3mm does not seem to pull through.
It is interesting to hear that people are using knots in conjunction with epoxy.
I only use a figure eight knot as a stopper knot. Are there other uses for it? Most importantly in standing rigging? Also I think I would be using 5 mm for. standing rigging.
Actually I've done a lot of googling and I am getting rather annoyed at the accuracy of information about creep available for various brands. Marlow for example says that their DM20 should be used for standing rigging and that it has NO creep. When one looks at their own specifications however in the same document the creep is given as "less than 1%". 1% is a hell of a lot in standing rigging. Some people are claiming 0.7% for SK78 which is supposed to have more stretch than SK99 let alone dm20.
Furthermore a graph is necessary as 1% is meaningless unless it is given in relation to a percentage of breaking strain or safe working load or something AND that particular percentage happens to correspond with what you intend to use for your standing ringing.
I have used epoxy to saturate bends and hitches and whippings for 40 years or more. Seamen don't tie knots! Whippings especially smeared with Araldite and then heated with a hot air gun as it's rotated makes a superb job. The figure of 8 loop I used on the boom vang of my Finn.
As far as the trailer sailer standing rigging is concerned I'm not sure I could be bothered. From my reading no matter what grade you get there is in reality no such thing as no stretch/creep and I don't want to go through a couple of re tensions and possibly more. Tensioning is not just a matter of turning a turnbuckle and lock nut.
The stuff is great for running rigging and lifelines and I probably should get some for the big boat while it is cheap but that is not my focus at the moment.
