Splicing both ends?

Burnham

Woods walker
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Here's a question I've been meaning to bring up for consideration...I see in the Sherrill catalog that they offer as an option when ordering climbing ropes, to have the rope spliced on both ends.

Now, if I look on their rope comparison chart, I see that they rate some ropes as milking, and some as not. But those same ropes that they say do milk, they are also offering to splice on both ends.

Is there a procedure to milk the cover prior to splicing that ensures no further milking in use? And if so, does it work well enough that you never get any additional milking?

If there is additional milking in use after splicing both ends, wouldn't that render the rope unfit to use?

I was reminded of my interest in the subject by this thread in the trading post forum: http://gypoclimber.com/showthread.php?13806-Brand-New-Spliced-200ft-Poison-Ivy-Climbing-Line
 
The only rope I ever had spliced at both ends was Arbormaster and I never had any issues with milking. If you had a rope with two splices and it milked, the only solution would be to make two ropes out of it.
 
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The chart lists Arbormaster as non-milking...I have never had milking with my own Blue Streak ropes, so I wouldn't worry about splicing both ends of it either, Brian.

I'm curious as to whether Sherrill is selling an option that will end up forceing the "solution" you refer to above on their customers, should they order something like Poison Ivy spliced both ends.
 
I had Nick splice both ends of my 200' blue moon rope. I didn't think about this as an issue. I just wanted to be able to alternate which end of the rope I use so it wears evenly (I hate knot terminations). I would be curious to hear more on this...
 
Since Blue moon is just a different coloured Poison Ivy, I think you'll have trouble with it. PI milks like a Jersey cow.

I've had a blue streak that was spliced both ends. Worked fine untill the ground personnel forgot to move it out of the drop zone and it got caught between a rock and a falling log:cry:
 
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If Nick spliced both ends of the Blue Moon, he MUST have some way of pre-milking it to ensure it doesn't milk into a lump between the ends...I say that 'cause I'm sure Nick wouldn't do otherwise, he's too much on the ball with ropes to make that mistake.
 
I have some rocket he spliced on both ends for me.

I swap ends every climb, and he did milk about 3-4 feet off before he did it, it has been good since i got it in the late winter.

He know his shit. :)
 
I don't see what the big deal would be as it will just milk back the other way. As for personal use, I often buy a 200' line and have both ends spliced then I cut it into a 120' and an 80' as those are the most usefull sizes around here
 
I read somewhere that Poison Ivy is now being woven to milk a lot less. My last one milked less than a foot. 80' - 120' is about perfect around here too.
 
Yale is the only manufacturer to pre-milk their lines before selling them. They just started doing this recently, so anybody who has experienced the "milking like a jersey cow" effect (which is an understatement, if anything - I've seen 10+ ft of milking on an older piece of Blaze) probably got their line before Yale started this. Yale now does this on Blaze, Poison Ivy, and Bluemoon (that I know of for sure - there may be others). So in theory, it is ok to splice both ends of a Yale double braid climbing line. But in reality Yale's pre-milking doesn't get 100% of the milking out because they cannot apply a very heavy load with lots of friction. So you still will usually get a few inches of milking going on. I saw approx 4" in my 200 ft of Bluemoon. This could potentially be enough milking to render one of the eye splices unsafe. This is why I normally don't recommend splicing both ends of a double braid climbing line, not even one that has been pre-milked by Yale.

Splicing both ends of a 16 strand is perfectly ok because they don't milk. If I owned 200 ft of Poison Ivy with an eye splice on each end, I would cut it in the middle and use it as two shorter lines because the only other alternative would be to cut one of the eye splices off and throw it away. Plus, ever since I got an eye splice get stuck in a crotch when pulling the line out from the ground, I think it's nice to have one blank end.
 
You don't have to cut it in the middle. You could cut off a nice lanyard length from one end and still have a very long rope.
 

:lol: In the US, Bluemoon really is just a different color of Poison Ivy. But this turns out not to be true in the rest of the world. Apparently the Poison Ivy sold here in the US is a completely different line than the Poison Ivy that is sold elsewhere. They are made out of different fibers, have different breaking strengths, and different % elongation.
 
How weird.
Any idea what the reasoning behind that is?
I have bought both my Poison Ivy and my new Blue Moon in the US, so mine are kosher.
 
How weird.
Any idea what the reasoning behind that is?
I have bought both my Poison Ivy and my new Blue Moon in the US, so mine are kosher.

Well, as Sean has mentioned, the US version of Poision Ivy/ Bluemoon is completly different from the Europeon version, the US version of Poision Ivy will not pass the standards needed to gain a CE mark so it is unable to be sold in Europe, the same goes for Bluemoon which also is not suitable to pass the standards set to enable it to gain the CE mark.
 
Burn, I have spliced both ends of my Euro version of Poison Ivy and also the Tachyon that I also have, both were used for a month or so before splicing both ends but the Tachyon continued to milk after both splices were completed so I had to eventually cut one end off, the PI though is fine and had minimal milking.
 
I've spliced the other ends of several lines, but all the lines were well worn, and most of the milking was over long ago. They were a bitch to splice, but turned out great.

The ropes were blaze, a tachyon, and poison ivy. A buddy of mine cut the old splice off my poison ivy because he kept forgetting which end to pull through the cambium saver!! I was pissed, but didn't say anything.
 
If Nick spliced both ends of the Blue Moon, he MUST have some way of pre-milking it to ensure it doesn't milk into a lump between the ends...I say that 'cause I'm sure Nick wouldn't do otherwise, he's too much on the ball with ropes to make that mistake.

Pardon my absence as of late. What with the marriage, then honeymoon, then several back to back trips at work...yikes.

But yes- when I splice an eye on both ends of the rope I will milk it out until I can't get an inch of cover to milk off the rope. Some ropes this only takes 2 times. Sometimes it can take 6-10 times. On double braid climbing lines 2-3 feet is typical.

I can't guarantee that this will stop the milking. I know that some people MUST have 2 eyes and this is the best I can do make sure they have the best chance of having the 2-eyed rope they want.

If it were my personal rope I'd do one eye, climb on it for a few weeks or months, THEN splice the other eye. Some people don't have that option, though.

love
nick
 
Swabish works well for milking ropes. I would clip the existing splice to a carabiner anchor point on a tree outside, run the rope all the way out, tie a tight swabish with an extra wrap or two (I found a swabish won't twist the rope as badly), and lean hard into the knot while "decending" the whole length of the line.
 
I use a bungee. It's 5/16 or 3/8" in diameter. I'll use a plain girth hitch or I'll add another wrap to make it a prusik for especially tenacious ropes.

Either way- let the rope (or bungee) do the work. Save your hands!
 
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