Making Rope With a Rope Club
It is easy to make serviceable rope with this simple tool. I use it often to make drawstrings for net storage bags.
To expand the capability of the club you can also use it in place of the hand drill in this instructable.
https://www.instructables.com/id/Rope-Making-With-...
Use the notch of the club as if it were the hook of the hand drill
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For my tool I already had a 1/2" diameter dowel, 8" in length. I drilled a 1/2" hole in a small piece of wood and placed it at the end of the dowel and glued and nailed it in place, I I took a scrap piece of wood (1 1/4" x 3/4" x 12") and drilled a 3/4" diameter hole and cut a notch as shown
I call this tool a rope club because it can really hurt if the spinning block of wood hits you when you are twisting the strands
You will also need a "C" clamp, a couple of "S" hooks and a length of twine tied in a loop. In this case the loop was 6' long
Put the "C" clamp in place as shown. Put one "S" hook with the unknotted end of the loop as shown and put the knotted end over the notch of the club
Maintaining tension between the two ends Move the hand holding the dowel in a clockwise direction. This will cause the club to rotate around the handle imparting a twist to the strands. Keep turning until a kink develops when you release the thesion between the two ends.
Put the twister on the surface. Place the second "S" hook as shown and pick up the twist at A and...place that "A" over the starting 'S" hook
Pull on the second "S" hook back to the club and place the bight over the notch. Now twist the club in a counter-clockwise direction.
You might need to push the club with your left hand to get it going during this phase
You should over twist this. Any extra twisting will correct itself when the ends are released
Tie a constrictor knots at each end. Slip out the "S" hook and cut the other end off the notch.
This method is easy but it takes up a lot of room. The 6' long loop became not quite 1 1/2' of rope. The coil of rope on the right is a little over 10' long. I needed 40' of clear space to set up the iniitial twisting
To make longer rope using the rope club go to the instructable "Making rope with a hand powered drill".