[HN Gopher] The Ashley Book of Knots (1944)
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The Ashley Book of Knots (1944)
Author : osculum
Score : 107 points
Date : 2023-09-27 16:13 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (archive.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (archive.org)
| smusamashah wrote:
| Knots are shared a lot here. There are sites listing hundreds of
| them each with its own strengths and weaknesses and use cases.
| But is there any science/math to them? For example, if I want to
| have not with specific set of features, is there something like
| an algorithm to build that knot from scratch?
| stvltvs wrote:
| The math of knots is more rudimentary than what you're asking
| for but still fascinating!
|
| https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8DBhTXM_Br4
| brunoqc wrote:
| Anyone has a mobile app recommendation for knots? EDIT(ABOK ->
| Grog) has one but it's outdated and not available on my device.
| davidjade wrote:
| I like Grog animated knots:
|
| https://www.animatedknots.com/
| brunoqc wrote:
| oh. I said "ABOK" when I meant "Grog". It looks great but
| it's outdated.
| iskela wrote:
| How can a knot be outdated? Seems odd in a thread about 80
| year old book.
| mighmi wrote:
| Clearly we have higher performing knots which leverage
| modern material benefits for less slippage, total
| movements/tying time and complexity etc.!
| Ishmaeli wrote:
| I think this might be my favorite kind of nonfiction book. Truly
| the Bible of knots.
|
| For years I have looked for a list of "Bibles" of their
| respective subjects, but have never found anything quite right.
|
| Chapman's Piloting & Seamanship is another example that comes to
| mind.
| waynesonfire wrote:
| i carry this book and a piece of string with me and try to tie
| various knots. very satisfying while i sit around.
|
| i find it very difficult to remember how to tie a knot when not
| practiced.
|
| i like the glue that the author recommends in the book for
| applying on string ends to prevent them from fraying, it's called
| duco cement -- comes in a green tube.
|
| some of the knots i've remember off the top of my head: bowline,
| constrictor knot, alpine knot, truckers hitch, midshipments
| hitch.
|
| and i'll end it with a fun fact,
|
| The Midshipman's Hitch Knot is promoted by Ashley (ABOK # 1993, p
| 325) as the only knot to tie in the following unlikely but
| critical circumstance: you fall overboard and catch hold of the
| line which you have prudently left trailing astern and find
| yourself hanging on with difficulty.
| westcort wrote:
| Although this is a good one, there are other interesting books
| and resources on knots here:
| https://www.locserendipity.com/TitleSearch.html?q=knot
| swalberg wrote:
| Know knots or tie lots!
|
| Knowing a few different knots for a variety of situations comes
| in handy. The right knot holds properly and can usually be undone
| when needed without having to cut it out.
|
| If you're starting out then the square knot, two half hitches,
| taught line hitch, clove hitch, and bowline cover most use cases.
| And, yes, those are among the basic ones taught to Scouts.
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| I would suggest adding the sheet bend (ABOK #1) to that list:
| if you ever end up not having enough rope, you will want to be
| able to join multiple sections together.
| swalberg wrote:
| Yea, another good Scout knot. While a square knot can do the
| same it can capsize under tension!
| Ishmaeli wrote:
| The Klutz Book of Knots was one of my favorites as a kid, and
| cited Ashley throughout. Here's what it had to say about the
| square knot:
|
| "But Which Knot Is Really The Best Knot?
|
| A true landlubber's question, but one that is inevitably
| raised. The correct answer should be the responsible--albeit
| boring--"It depends." Are you knotting together sheets for an
| open-air exit from a burning hotel? Or are you tying up your
| hair?
|
| But let's say you've really only got room for two or three
| knots in your long-term memory files. If such were the case, I
| could be forced to recommend the bowline, the sheet bend, and
| the clove hitch. The three of them are the class of the three
| primary knot categories--loop knots, rope-to-rope knots
| (bends), and rope-to-something-else knots (hitches). Between
| them, they should get you into most binds.
|
| Incidentally, the opposite question, "Which is really the worst
| knot?" is far simpler to answer. As disillusioning as this
| sounds, it's the square knot, the most over-hyped, under-
| strength knot in creation. Clifford Ashley, the author of the
| definitive encylopedia on the subject of knotting, states that
| the square knot "...has probably been responsible for more
| deaths and injuries than all other knots combined."
|
| The reason is that the square knot capsizes, i.e. it unties
| itself. A couple of quick tugs on the rope, or an inadvertant
| bump, and the honest square knot turns into thin air, an
| unhappy result that demonstrates the difference between a
| "strong" knot, one that weakens the rope least, and a "secure"
| knot, one that resists unraveling."
|
| This was disillusioning when I first read it as an avid Boy
| Scout. Now I can't think of a more apt symbol for the Scouting
| program.
| hooverd wrote:
| Don't forget the Sommerville bowline. Easy to tie and won't
| collapse under tension.
| 123pie123 wrote:
| a very simple knot that has been very useful to me and yet
| simple to learn is the - round turn and two half hitches knot.
| for tying a line or rope under tension
| loloquwowndueo wrote:
| *taut line hitch.
| hprotagonist wrote:
| ABOK is wonderful. I have my grandfather's copy, which is
| somewhat in need of a rebinding but otherwise in good shape.
|
| https://www.animatedknots.com offers an app with some animations
| of knots that cites ABOK numbers and page numbers, and i have
| that installed on my phone.
| Tao3300 wrote:
| I love Grog's site. I wanted to buy the app but apparently my
| Android version is too new :(
| weeksie wrote:
| When I was a kid on the gillnetter I'd read that book all the
| time and would practice tying some of the more elaborate knots. I
| wish I still had my dad's old marlin spike. Had it for years,
| with a wobbly old turk's head I'd tied on the eyelet. Gobbled up
| by the mists of time (an old girlfriend threw my shit out a dozen
| years ago and it was a casualty)
| AlbertCory wrote:
| A long time ago, I took the Sierra Club Basic Mountaineering
| Training Course (which was since abolished after some lawsuits!).
|
| We practiced the bowline-on-a-coil and belaying someone on flat
| land, and then we did rock climbing, belaying each other.
|
| I had a gentleman on the climbing end, who shouted "on belay" to
| which I responded "belay on."
|
| Then he yelled "falling." I was sitting with my feet braced, and
| I'd practiced holding with my legs instead of my arms, so I was
| able to keep him from getting hurt. I guess nowadays I could
| monetize that, if I had it on video.
| jonah wrote:
| The risk with the Bowline is that it can work itself loose if
| it is repeatedly tensioned and loosened. It _definitely_ needs
| a backup safety knot on the tail.
| yardshop wrote:
| Or tie it as a double round-turn bowline, with an extra turn
| for both the "rabbit" going around the tree, and for the
| hole.
|
| In a previous job I had to constantly take my office master
| key out of my pocket and put it back. Before long I made a
| lanyard for it with a brass clip to go on a belt loop and a
| regular split ring on the other end, both attached with a
| normal bowline. After a short period, maybe a few weeks to a
| month, I noticed it loosening up. I retied it with double
| round-turn bowlines on each end, and it held together like
| that for years.
| at_a_remove wrote:
| I have problems with knots, I am terrible with them, despite
| having some books.
|
| I think what I really need is a flowchart (what are you tying to
| what else? what kind of cordage do you have? what kind on the
| other end, if applicable?) with a list of knots at one end, with
| their various strengths and weaknesses.
|
| The jargon is a bit of an issue, too.
| nas wrote:
| You can make due with only a couple of good knots. Very short
| list: the reef knot (square knot, avoid the granny version) and
| the alpine butterfly (don't use reef knot for joining two
| ropes, i.e. a "bend"). The alpine butterfly is more useful to
| know than the bowline, IMHO.
|
| If you want to expand your list a little, here are some
| additional useful ones: double fisherman's, adjustable grip
| hitch, sheet bend, trucker's hitch.
|
| Edit: I suppose this is more useful with a little additional
| commentary. The reef knot is so common that you should know it
| and know how to avoid the granny knot and also when not to use
| it (e.g. as a bend). You can use the alpine butterfly as a bend
| and also for quite few other things. It is more versatile than
| the bowline (e.g. if you need a loop that doesn't slip) and
| works fine as a bend (very smiilar to the Zeppelin bend).
| at_a_remove wrote:
| Right, but this isn't a _what_ question, it 's a _when to do
| what_ question. I might know a knot, but I don 't know when
| to use that knot and when it ought to be avoided. That's what
| I am getting at.
|
| Even under the "bend" page in Wikipedia, sometimes the knots
| are merely described.
| teeray wrote:
| The Marlinspike hitch is my favorite :) If you stick anything
| functioning as a marlinspike in there (stick, screwdriver, etc.),
| you get a great handle for pulling in tension. If you put a hook
| in there, you have a hitch onto the hook that can be released by
| slipping it off (and the whole knot collapses in on itself). If
| you stick the tag end one way instead, you end up with a great
| stopper knot (Oysterman's Stopper Knot) that is triple the
| diameter of the cordage. If you stick the tag end in another way,
| you end up a Bowline--and it's a whole lot faster tying it than
| the "rabbit-around-the-tree" method.
| dougalm wrote:
| > a great stopper knot (Oysterman's Stopper Knot)
|
| Also known as the Ashley stopper knot! I've started keeping a
| short length of paracord on my desk to practice knots during
| video calls. It makes a great fidget toy. The Ashley stopper is
| what I've been tying this week and it's such a gem (but a
| little harder to untie than I'd like).
|
| ABOK is the classic. But I was surprised to learn recently that
| it's not the final word on knots. Superior knots like the
| Zeppelin bend don't appear in it and there have even been
| useful knots invented since it was published. Geoffrey
| Budworth's "The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Knots and Ropework"
| includes knots that were invented in the 80s.
| Tao3300 wrote:
| I've started the same habit. Practicing Chinese Button Knots
| today.
| neves wrote:
| Does it have an index pointing to each knot or categorizing them?
| It would be really nice to know which knot to use in each
| occasion. I couldn't find the index.
| justin_oaks wrote:
| I often keep a short piece of paracord or nylon rope in my pocket
| for tying knots. It works well for keeping my hands busy. I'll
| often tie a chain sinnet, a series of half-hitches so that they
| spiral, a diamond knot, or just a bunch of other knots that I try
| to remember how to tie.
|
| What knots do you tie when you're just trying to keep your hands
| busy?
| obloid wrote:
| Zeppelin bend and Carrick bend are my favorites. The knots I
| actually use the most in daily life are bowline and trucker
| hitch. I'm partial to constrictor knots as well.
| fenomas wrote:
| What I love about ABOK is that, while it's exhaustive and
| technical, there's still a lot of personality in the descriptions
| and commentary. Not only in the chapter headings, but even the
| knot descriptions sometimes have random little anecdotes, and you
| get the sense that the author must have been quite a guy.
|
| A favorite quote:
|
| > The topsail halyard bend is said to be a yachting hitch, but it
| is possible that it has never appeared outside the covers of a
| book. It has one more turn than the studding-sail bend and this,
| like the second tablespoonful of castor oil, savors of
| redundancy.
| pjdesno wrote:
| I still have a copy I was given when I was a kid.
|
| What's kind of amazing is that it's from when there were still a
| few commercial sailing ships around.
| thenobsta wrote:
| Clifford Ashley was one of the last marlinspike seamen. What an
| encyclopedic knowledge of knots. I pull my copy out every now
| and then and just sit and tie knots and/or share useful knots
| with my kiddo.
| jrh3 wrote:
| And the stories he tells about the origin of knots and people
| he learned them from are great.
| kaushalvivek wrote:
| Saw this video on Knot Theory a while back -- the developments in
| this obscure branch of mathematics have been phenomenal in the
| last century, with wide-ranging impact.
|
| https://youtu.be/8DBhTXM_Br4?si=vDfNBPXpj4OMfLPY
| 303uru wrote:
| Topology is super interesting. Thanks for the video!
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| _Related_ :
|
| Big knots discussion earlier this month:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37346115
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