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nquigley

Sustaining Member
I saved some money by buying 3 mm dyneema (55c/ft) for the 4 long segments (upper and lower life lines from gates to pulpit), but to get to the recommended 6mm thickness, I used a long home-made fid to pull a length of 3 mm dyneema through another 3 mm piece, before splicing the ends. I did buy 6 mm dyneema ($2.75/ft) for the short segments surrounding the cockpit to make the splicing easier.
 

bgary

Advanced Beginner
Blogs Author
...to make the splicing easier.

What kind of splicing did you do? simple long-bury, or locked brummel, or...?

And did you splice onto removable/adjustable fittings, similar to wire, or straight onto the pulpit pieces?

Bruce
 

nquigley

Sustaining Member
What kind of splicing did you do? simple long-bury, or locked brummel, or...?

And did you splice onto removable/adjustable fittings, similar to wire, or straight onto the pulpit pieces?

Bruce
Hi Bruce,
To make the 6mm line from 2 thicknesses of 3mm line, I started with (more than) twice the needed length of 3mm. I made a very long puller-style fid by bending 18-gauge wire in half - the fid was about 80% of the length of the final lifeline length (~18'). I fed the bent end of the fit inside one end of the line, all the way to the midpoint, pushing it out about 1" before the actual midpoint mark. Then, I inserted the other end of the line into the crook of the fid, and retracted the fid and line tail all the way back through the first end of the line. I pushed it out when the length from the midpoint was about 24" short of the desired overall length of the finished lifeline. (From memory, my upper lifeline had to be ~240" long.)
At this point, I had about 210" of 3mm line inside a 'cover' of 3 mm line, with a 2" loop at one end (the original midpoint of the starting double-length line), and at the other end, I had two 3mm line tails that were about 20-24"long. I made locking brummel eye splices in the ends of both of those tails that were just big enough to fit over a 6mm Taska friction ring. The eye splice tails were buried all the way to the split point where one line came out of the other (~18"), and I stitched the length of the bury with sail repair thread to prevent the tail from coming out - dyneema is super-slippery stuff!

For the final installation (to avoid bending the dyneema tightly at the ends), there was a 6mm friction ring at each end: the midpoint loop went over one ring, and the pair of 3mm tails both went over the other ring. At one end (bow), the friction ring fitted neatly into the end of a turnbuckle so that it's clevis pin went through the hole in the ring. I got turnbuckles with almost 8" of adjustment to accommodate the inevitable imprecision in the finished line length after splicing. At the other (non-adjustable) lifeline terminus, I used a shackle to connect the friction ring to the ss loop on the stanchion.

It was a bit fiddly getting the finished length right - you have to do a lot of milking in both directions to get the cover and the core to have roughly equal tensions. The friction rings cost about $10 ea - drives the overall project cost up a bit, but ensures the dyneema doesn't have to make a sharp turn around a stanchion loop or clevis pin.
The lifelines around the cockpit, though, are simple 6 mm lines, with brummel lock eye splices, that each go over a friction ring. The rings are attached to the pushpit lifeline attachment loops with shackles.

I'll take photos when I can and post them here.
Cheers,
Neil
 
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