4-strand nylon rope

[Plomong]

I recently bought a nylon anchor warp from my usual (dependable) supplier, thinking that anchor warp is always 3-strand if not octoplait nylon. My surprise today as I prepared to splice the rope to the anchor chain was to find the rope is 4-strand.

Is that an indicator of poor quality, or of oriental manufacture ?? Can I trust it to be the correct material and grade for the intended purpose ?

Does anyone know how to distinguish the real thing from the oriental cheapies mentioned on this forum on several occasions ??

 

[gandy]

Have you tried to splice it? It should work, shouldn't it. The old painter on our tender was two-strand twisted, which spliced OK.

 

[Plomong]

Yes. Started the job, but couldn't finish -- Had forgotten to take the instructions. Will try again tomorrow.

 

[duncan]

lol - 4 strand sounds like the easiest chain splice possible!

 

[GMac]

4 strand is around but I'm surprised to see it selling in the recreational retail type market. Very unusual.

Nothing wrong with a 4 strand at all and it'll splice up well when you remember how

The chances are very very high it was made in the east. The US, EU and so on are just getting the c**p kicked out of them with regards to the common 'non-technical' sort of ropes.

This is 'not always' a bad thing and Korea has a very strong and OK quality rope industry. The chances of identifying the rope without a lot of knowlege is slim I would say. I'd also say it will not be a top end raw material rope i.e a Type66. Most likly a Type 6 which is OK for an anchor rode. The big differance between a Type 66 and a 6 is Thermal Stability and manufactuer quality. Type 6 (the most common by far) has less thermal stabilty hence it will go harder and yucky faster, sometimes a lot faster.

The type 66 is the best to use but the East does not use this much at all, if at all. generally the Type66 is only used by the top end names in the game like Samson, Marlow (used to) hence you also get the better build quality i.e better lubrication, torque balanced and so on. The chances are you would notice the lot bigger price attached to this rope.

If you realy want to know ask the person who sold it to you. If they sold a 4 strand they should know as most people don't even know it exists so it would have had to have been specifically ordered as a 4 strand. This is assuming the bloke knows 'something' and he did not realise what he is selling, which would be a tad spooky.

The more I think about it and not wanting to be rude but are you sure it is a Nylon? 4 strand is mostly polyprop or polyethelyne only these days.

 

[snowleopard]

Traditionally 4-strand rope was called 'hawser laid' and twisted the opposite way to 3-strand 'cable laid' rope. No reason why it should be any harder to splice than 3 strand, you just do everything 4 times insted of 3. After all, 6-strand wire rope can also be spliced (by the brave).

 

[Plomong]

It is definitely Nylon -- at least the label on the drum said so!!!

As for asking the seller, he probably didn't even know it was 4-strand. I'll tell him the next time I'm in that port.

Thanks for your information. I'm more confident now that the new rode will do the job -- that was my chief worry. Whether it has 3, 4 or whatever number of strands, doesn't really matter so long as the physical properties of the rope are adequate for the job (Max safe working load, elasticity, etc). Resistance to UV is probably not too important, as most of its life will be spent in the anchor locker, and under chain at that.

 

[GMac]

[ QUOTE ]
It is definitely Nylon -- at least the label on the drum said so!!!

As for asking the seller, he probably didn't even know it was 4-strand. I'll tell him the next time I'm in that port.

Thanks for your information. I'm more confident now that the new rode will do the job -- that was my chief worry. Whether it has 3, 4 or whatever number of strands, doesn't really matter so long as the physical properties of the rope are adequate for the job (Max safe working load, elasticity, etc). Resistance to UV is probably not too important, as most of its life will be spent in the anchor locker, and under chain at that.

[/ QUOTE ]

You've got it. This is good.
All you need to do is sort that splicing now /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif, good luck. Just remember not 1 2 3 but 1 2 3 4 /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[JonA]

Four strand rope was traditionally known as shroud laid, often made of lightly tarred Italian hemp and used for standing rigging before steel wire took over. Latterly it was used for the lanyards rove through deadeyes.
Hawser laid rope is three right hand, three strand, cable laid ropes laid up left handed.
Incidently the whips used with Coastguard breaches buoys were left hand laid three strand ropes. Apparantly this was supposed to stop them getting twisted together.

Jonathan