Ahoy mates!

Crew-member Den Holmes (densships) shares his technique of making rope rigging with a "rope-walk", in the MSW SBS feature!


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If you have comments or questions please post them here.

Thanks!
~Gunny

I have always liked the big sailing ships. I have also wanted to try building one of those big plank on ships (fav has always been "Old Ironsides"). This would be a great way to add detail to a ship like that. Great article and very informative.

We made rope with a system similar to this in Boy Scouts. It took a good deal of time, but you had a good rope when you were done. That is one very good feature. Thank you for sharing this lost art with us.

Awesome work Den. Thanks for sharing.

later...Gator

Nice rig, good pix, very handy tool! I can see use for this in the future...(hopefully not too far). Thanks Dennis, well done

I have been looking at your instructions for building and operating a ropewalk. The comment attached to photo #20 says... "As you turn, the left end will try to move toward the right end since the rope is shortening due to the twisting of the yarns. Let the movement occur, but do not let the rope go slack."

Question: Since both ends of the ropewalk are screwed to the baseboard, otherwise fixed in their position, how can movement occur?

When I tried my ropewalk for the first few times, only a few inches of rope laid up, and as I continued to twist up the yarns, one finally broke because of too much tension. I'm feeling like a dunce, as though I did something wrong. Duuuuhhhh!