Hammock width narrow vs wide?

[Armor Like Fire]

Hey guys its viper!
Alright thismquestinmprobablymgoesmwith out saying but I just wanted to make sure before I tried to make one like this.
So like most commercial hammocks like eno kammock stuff like that have two colors and e outside color that's sewn into the main part of the body is about 7 and 1/2 inches on each side. I know they make big hammock as in width, but rule,of thumb is the more wide your hammock is e flatter you can lay at a diagonal and the more diagonal you can lay I guess right?
I have made sevril hammocks from the bolts of ripstop nylon you can buy at Joan's but I haven't really payed attention to how wide those bolts are so if anyone knows let me know please! but anyways im wanting to make a two times hammock such at the ones I listed above. But I don't want to I guess make them like that unless it has a pompous either making sitting in it easyer or laying more flat or laying more comfortably some now.
I have 200yrds of ripstop coming in the mail Rolf! But still don't want to waste my time making something That's not practical. So I guess to cum it up.
Adding the extra colors(5-7/12inches on each side) would it have a use? Thanks guys!!

[nothermark]

The most common DIY hammock material is a 60" wide roll. Some of the more specialized material is 48" or 72". I don't know but I would guess the commercial folks are sewing on the side stripes to add some shape to tighten up the sides along with the color.

[gmcttr]

...But I don't want to I guess make them like that unless it has a pompous either making sitting in it easyer or laying more flat or laying more comfortably some now...

Length has a greater effect on the ability to increase your diagonal to get a flatter lay than width does. Width just makes higher side walls (which may or may not increase your comfort when sitting sideways).

https://www.hammockforums.net/forum/...ad.php?t=59836

[pizza]

Length has a greater effect on the ability to increase your diagonal to get a flatter lay than width does. Width just makes higher side walls (which may or may not increase your comfort when sitting sideways).

https://www.hammockforums.net/forum/...ad.php?t=59836

I'd have to agree with that. I currently have a WL Lite Owl and a WBBB XLC. The BB is about 7 inches wider than the Lite Owl but the lay is pretty much the same because they are both 11 feet long. I have in the past owned a couple WBBB original hammocks with the 10 foot length but same width as the XLC. The 11 foot length is easier to get a flatter lay on the diagonal than the 10 foot and easy to dial out the center ridge. Not that 10 foot was bad, but the 11 foot "for me" just works better. I also briefly owned a hammock that was only 9 feet 4 inches long and 6 inches narrower even than the Lite Owl. That hammock did not work out for me at all. It felt extremely confining and had a nasty center ridge that I just couldn't dial out.

[tammons]

5' is the right width for me. Any more and the sides just flap around, less and it just doesnt lay right, but I also think the length has to be correct for height. For me at 6'-3" and 240 12' is about as short as I want to go.

[scryan]

Length has a greater effect on the ability to increase your diagonal to get a flatter lay than width does. Width just makes higher side walls (which may or may not increase your comfort when sitting sideways).

https://www.hammockforums.net/forum/...ad.php?t=59836

I think just from a physics/geometry stand point there are two things your saying there and one is right, one isn't... (no offense, your effectively right anyways)

"Length has a greater effect on the ability to get a flatter lay than width does"
Right
"Length has a greater effect on the ability to increase your diagonal"
Wrong

Basically width allows you diagonal.
Whatever angle you are at from the centerline, your height times the sine of that angle is how much width you take up. If the width of the hammock is less than that... you can't go that diagonal. If the width is more then that, you can.

If you make it easier and think of a U shaped hammock, one hung with WAY WAY too much sag then with the sides pulled out...

The material in the center follows that U directly. The material at the sides follows that U, but also has to travel from the gathered point in the center out sideways... so a longer length would be required for it to hang as low.
So with a rectangle hung like this the material in the middle would hang lower, and as you said then ends would curl up.

So really you have the two components...
The width allows you to turn diagonally (I know some hammocks like the GTUL lack the width to really get diagonal), the length helps maintain comfort by not causing so much curvature at the sides.
You need to balance these two factors if you want to find how small of a hammock you find comfortable. A very short, but very wide hammock would allow you more diagonal then a very long but narrow one...Though neither may be what you would want

[gmcttr]

Yes, we're basically in agreement, but where I'm coming from is, for practical hammock lengths and hanging distances, once you have a width of ~60", going wider doesn't increase the amount of diagonal rotation you can achieve without the curvature of your lay increasing...you just end up back in the banana shape.

Once you have a 60" wide hammock, varying the length from 9'-12' will have a greater effect on flatness of lay (and generally in comfort) than additional increases in the width.

If I understood correctly, the OP has 72" wide fabric on order and is asking if adding strips to make it even wider would make the hammock more comfortable. My thought is no.

[Mountnman]

I tried a 90" wide tablecloth hammock just to see how it would do and it was to wide, I cut it to 72" and it lays perfect at 11' long. I'm about to order a 60" one to see how it hangs and see how much weight I could save cutting an extra foot off the width.

[sargevining]

I think just from a physics/geometry stand point there are two things your saying there and one is right, one isn't... (no offense, your effectively right anyways)

"Length has a greater effect on the ability to get a flatter lay than width does"
Right
"Length has a greater effect on the ability to increase your diagonal"
Wrong

Basically width allows you diagonal.
Whatever angle you are at from the centerline, your height times the sine of that angle is how much width you take up. If the width of the hammock is less than that... you can't go that diagonal. If the width is more then that, you can.

If you make it easier and think of a U shaped hammock, one hung with WAY WAY too much sag then with the sides pulled out...

The material in the center follows that U directly. The material at the sides follows that U, but also has to travel from the gathered point in the center out sideways... so a longer length would be required for it to hang as low.
So with a rectangle hung like this the material in the middle would hang lower, and as you said then ends would curl up.

So really you have the two components...
The width allows you to turn diagonally (I know some hammocks like the GTUL lack the width to really get diagonal), the length helps maintain comfort by not causing so much curvature at the sides.
You need to balance these two factors if you want to find how small of a hammock you find comfortable. A very short, but very wide hammock would allow you more diagonal then a very long but narrow one...Though neither may be what you would want

You are correct, and its simple trigonometry.

One way to think of how width can increase the angle of the lay relative to the longitudinal centerline is this:

A man who is 60 inches tall can lay 90 degrees to the longitudinal centerline of a hammock that is 60 inches wide, but a man who is 72 inches tall cannot. As a result, the man who is 60" tall will get an extremely flat lay, and the 72" tall man not as much, given the same distance along a theoretical ridgeline above. Increase the length of that ridgeline, however, and his lay will flatten out as the length of the arc described by the hammock increases and the chord decreases.

The 72" tall man could, theoretically, get a hammock that was 80" long by 72" wide and hang it between two trees 36" apart and he would get a flat lay if he laid in the hammock across its width, but he would be curled up like a pretzel if he tried doing it along its length--even at a diagonal.

This is how a bridge hammock works. Try laying across the narrow dimension of a bridge hammock to test the theory.

[Armor Like Fire]

Dang 0_o
Well my hammock is roughly 59inches wide I was planning on making my new one about 70 inches wide would that be a bad idea then? Or would that 11inches total not make a negative effect on me? I just don't want to make anything negative on my sleeping in the hammock.