(EU) cheap spliceable rope for practice and more

[nanok]

sometimes people ask here about rope to start their splicing adventures for whoopie slings and such, without spoiling precious dyneema with the first attempts. i'm always on the lookout for cheap spliceable rope myself, as i like to mess with it, and it's useful to have around.

so, recently, i found a few handy sources:

- hornbach (sort of a home depot or such here in eu), they have some 2mm polypropylene line which seems good quality (feels nice, nice blue color too) and is very nice to splice. i don't have a rig to measure accurately, but i broke a few samples with my weight, and pulled a few to over 25kg or so without damage, i would estimate it breaks somewhere in the 30-40kg range, which makes it already useful for various things, like tarp guylines and other small load projects. (it is also surprisingly close to nylon lines in the same size, which is pretty impressive)
price is about 0.15euro /m, being PP it's lighter even than dyneema

- lidl (supermarket chain, that has their own brand of tools and such): they have spools of 2mm and 1.7mm PP, both spliceable, both perfectly capable of over 20kg when spliced, again i can only estimate for now, i'd guess the 2mm to break around 40kg, the 1.7 around 30kg. doesn't feel as nice as the hornbach one, but it's even easier to splice (very loose braid), and it's 2euro/50m spool (dirt cheap). the 2mm is some sort of orange-pink, the 1.7 is some radioactive light green, both look rather nice actually.

my "spliceability tests" were all done with a bent piece of wire, nothing fancy.

all these hold friction hitches very nicely (a blake hitch is my usual test, with all these lines it holds very nicely, and when grabbed to slide it it releases like nothing else i've seen. it's both slippery and grippy somehow).

hope it helps someone, happy splicing

[shichimi]

Hey Nanok!
Thanks for sources.
I am from Russia so there is no realy cheap sources of UHMWPE rope . I mostly buy amsteel from Dutch . You can find average quality UHMWPE rope from aliexpress.
And there is brand called Lanex (they are based at Czech Republic ) they are making UHMWPE rope as well .

[nanok]

hey shichimi, privet, hello again.

as i think i mentioned elsewhere, for uhmwpe i just buy on amazon.de, liros/kanirope, it's a german manufacturer, broad range of sizes etc, about 1eu/m for a 100m spool of the 3mm line (950dan mbs), and i'm happy enough with that with the caveats i mentioned in the thread dedicated to that topic. another good source that most people might find locally is uhwmpe throwline, found in arborist shops (some of it is uhmwpe, easy to tell which, it's the expensive one ), the problem with that is it tends to be too thin for suspension, for my taste (the stein throwline comes in 2.2mm max, 450dan), but i know some people might even use it for that.

i came across lanex online as well, but ironically i was not able to find any way to buy their products...in their own country. oh well. germany is close enough.

but this pp rope, dirt cheap, lightweight and spliceable, and available in "your local supermarket" is a wonderful thing, it's orders of magnitude cheaper than uhmwpe, so you can experiment all you like, and it's also useful for projects around the house (why store crappy cheap twine for such purposes, when i can store crappy cheap spliceable twine, that's actually not that crappy after all). it is also several times cheaper than nylon.

how are you doing otherwise? any new developments with your tarp tensioning experiments etc? cheers in any case

[cougarmeat]

A few times a year, West Marine has a sale on Amsteel. With 40% off, you could consider getting a length - say 5 feet or so (I bought a 3 ft length and wish it was longer) of half inch Amsteel. It makes it much easier to practice and demonstrate weaving - making eyes and buries and making an eye with just one end of the line available. Easier to form and eye or loop and then take it out again. Then transfer your learning/skill to 7/64 or smaller sizes.

[shichimi]

Hi Nanok!
There is no new development of sort.I think VT tensioning for guylines is best for me right now.
I am slowly starting to sew some projects from dyneema, stuffsacks and zip pouches.
And I found some webshop from Germany wich sell some UHMWPE ropes and other stuff for making gear. I recomend you check this out. extremtextil.de
Cheers , pal!

[jadekayak]

I never had a problem with 3mm dyneema.

Great tutorials on yt and i can splice std 3 and 4 ply ropes already.

My eye splice is a bit untidy though.


Hollow core splicing is just so easy you dont need to much practice for hammock related items

[swoody126]

1/4" polypropylene rope is made just like Amstee Blue and slick too

larger than most of the stuff used by hangers butt works the same

100' hanks are about $9 @ big box stores like Lowes and Home Depot

smaller amounts can be had at most of the $1 stores for cheap

get some of it and practice

sw

[nanok]

Hi Nanok!
There is no new development of sort.I think VT tensioning for guylines is best for me right now.
I am slowly starting to sew some projects from dyneema, stuffsacks and zip pouches.
And I found some webshop from Germany wich sell some UHMWPE ropes and other stuff for making gear. I recomend you check this out. extremtextil.de
Cheers , pal!

hey, that's cool, i'm really glad it works for you. the fact there's probably only two other similar ones in use in the world (that is, mine ), i'm not sure if it's a bonus, or a sad thing, but cool conversation starter. ("what's this, i've neever seen the like" "indeed you haven't, cause there isn't" :P )

i haven't played at all with dyneema composite fabrics, i'm really curious what you think/how it goes

indeed, extremtextil.de is cool, it's where i got all my ripstop to make the hammocks and such; i consider it the closest i could find, on this continent, to rsbtr. last time i was there, they were still not selling uhmwpe rope, so thanks a lot for pointing it out, that's great (and both rope and webbing i see, which is great, as dyneema webbing for treestraps is so difficult to find). sadly, it seems they don't have dyneema in the 3mm/10kN range of size, so i would still likely use amazon.de in the end. but the webbing choices are pretty nice.

cheers!