Tarp can look good and tight when the hammock is empty. Some trees give a bit when I get in the hammock and thus the tarp sags a bit.
So I have always likes the tensioners.
But not everyone has to or need to like them or use them.
Shug
Tarp can look good and tight when the hammock is empty. Some trees give a bit when I get in the hammock and thus the tarp sags a bit.
So I have always likes the tensioners.
But not everyone has to or need to like them or use them.
Shug
Whooooo Buddy)))) All Secure in Sector Seven
that is not the case, nylon cord (depending also on how it is braided) has quite a bit of ellastic stretch, unrelated to absorbing water, it does all the jobs you mention before, without needing shock cord. the main difference is that a reasonably long guyline has a much broader range of ellasticity than a short piece of shock cord (so say a nylon guyline, spanning 1m (3ft) between tieout and stake, will stretch by up to 30cm (12-ish inches), that's quite some range of movement to allow the tarp to deal with wind and whatnot. a 10cm piece of shock cord will at best double its length before it snaps, so 10 more cm, and unlike the guyline, if you span a longer distance to your stake or anchor, you won't get more range of movement.
as cougarmeat explains below, stretch cannot be replaced by an adjustable system, stretch is ellastic, and ellasticity has it's applications, and a good adjustment system has theirs, the two things complement eachother.
i agree the purposes above are worthwhile, my question is just: for all this, why not just use nylon guylines (or similar, non-dyneema), which have built in stretch, and as a bonus are much nicer to operate for knots and such (not to mention price)? why introduce dyneema for guylines saying "the less stretch the better" when shortly after we come back and say "ah, but add a piece of rubber there somewhere, see, you need some stretch". does it make sense to not remove the stretch that was there in the first place? that's all i'm asking.
as i explain above, i find the stretch which (small dimaeter, braided) nylon rope to be a lot more useful and versatile than what a small piece of shock cord can offer, but perhaps i'm missing something
KISS. Over the years I've used a variety of tent, tarp, and fly tie out knots. However in the end it seems more likely than not, or knot, I default to a clove hitch on a bight. Probably an offshoot of using the clove hitch for adjusting belay anchors. Simple and quick. Sure I periodically need to readjust as the tarp stretches and things settle, no big deal.
I use option #2, ever since I switched to an all-in-one hammock/tarp suspension. Without shock cord tensioners, the tarp would loosen a bit after I entered the hammock. After adding the shock cord, perfect!
Here's another alternative that you may want to consider: An Internal Tarp Tensioner. I use this with 1.75 mm zing-it and it works great.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVVpA_AJb5M
Iceman857
"An optimist is a man who plants two acorns and buys a hammock" - Jean de Lattre de Tassigny (French Army General in WWII)
Some people use doodads and not knots to tension there line so not holding a knot with dyneema isn't as important. Less stretch with dyneema means less fluctuation depending upon tarp material wind trees ect. Just one less thing to worry about. The big thing I think your forgetting is rebound. Bungee gives you rebound so you don't need to physically go retighten lines. For me it's the few inches of play it gives me. I'm less likely to damage my tarp when I trip over my lines half asleep for my 3 am swiss.
> why not just use nylon guylines (or similar, non-dyneema), which have built in stretch,
Because "stretch" is not "bounce back" - the characteristic that is, for me, the purpose of using bungee. Also, as a financial matter - though pretty small compared to other gear expenses - I already have an investment non-stretch guylines. So I take about 10 inches of bungee if we take away an inch on each end for a knot, that gives me 8 inch working length. IF it expands to twice that, say 16 inches, then I take 80% of that or a bit over a foot. I tie the bungee to the top of the guyline where it meets the tarp, and tie the other end about a foot down on the guyline - limiting the stretch to 80% of maximum. Just a little project to make a set of those guylines while watching the NFL.
But it doesn't look very elegant. I like the idea of the internal tarp tensioner covered in the YouTube video mentioned above. It's just that the strength/cost of 1.75mm or 2.2mm ZingIt/LashIt seems so overkill.
In order to see what few have seen, you must go where few have gone. And DO what few have done.
by stretch i meant ellastic deformation, so i guess one could use the term "bounce back"/"rebound". i know there's also some length change also associated to water (which is commonly also called stretch), in the case of nylon, but that's a different matter (and, in my experience, it is not an issue for practical purposes. perhaps i need more experience, but autumn is here, so rain it shall...)
having said that, i will continue to play with nylon and other "non-dyneema" for tarps, whenever i get a chance to go out for more than a few hours, and i might find i'm missing something, but meanwhile i was just sharing what i found so far, and how i think it works/what i think might be important/useful. i have no doubt i have still a lot to learn
for "limited tensioners" i really liked to make them in parallel, when i was evaluating the ellastic tensioners solution; which i think is exactly what you are describing (imho it is the best solution, if one is going to use shock cord for this. and i personally think it looks very ellegant)
I use a dyneema style CRL. However all my tie outs for the tarp are simple dacron. I get the 300lb test that is sold as planer board line (for fishing). Little stretch, nice color selection, doesn't absorb water. I simply larks head a length onto the rings. Where ever I want to peg down I simply have an overhand knot. There are often 4 knots on each length. I would never use shock cord. I hate having the wind whip my tarp around in the wind. Shock cord has to much give to it in strong winds. Dacron also doesn't knot up easy when you stuff your tarp into the skins so it's nice when you go to set up.. just unravels. KISS
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