Tips for optimal whoopie usage? (Hoping to use the 'free tail' to somehow 'snug' and/or secure things better and unsure what's best)

cerberus

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As title says, basically :P
With my Safebloc whoopie, which I made extra long, I'm often in a situation where I can make a longer eye and wrap that eye around the stem an extra wrap, or simply do one wrap with the eye and have that giant tail hanging, which I tend to just take and run to the Bloc and basically cow hitch it.

Feel like there's gotta be ways/configurations here that I'm missing, any advice would be appreciated! Heck even besides "what to do with the tail", I'm still uncertain if it's smarter to lengthen the adjustable eye to get 2 wraps around the stem (I've been thinking it is, simply because it keeps more rope-in-system..)

Thanks!
 
When I set my blocks with a loopie or whoopie I try an snug it up tight but sometimes I get lazy and there is some siop, it still works fine.
 
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  • #4
Don't believe what you hear, longer isn't always better
rofl that's why I never used my Safebloc when I first got it, I built "the ideal" sling for it which I reckoned was 3/4" polydyne and nearly 20' of it or over 15' at least, dead-eye, allowing virtually anything and with super-strength compared to TEC....its weight, and tying a long tail, made it so I never ever used it :P Got some 3/4 tec to make the whoopie and now I use it which is nice because it's such great hardware, my last go-to was the 3-ring, 6' x-ring sling and that gives maybe 50% the friction the Bloc does, so for solo-rigging I can say use the Bloc as terminal and set some XL's right-beside and the friction is crazy also you can easily create a wider 'top' to the rigging line's path/arch by spreading them :)

Sometimes longer is better, though, with my favorite sling (I call it the snake lol) which is a 10' length of 3/4 polydyne that's got an XL on each end....I'm often in spreading canopies so its length lets me just hang each end through a different crotch and bam it's like I just set 2 slings when it's really one, and the polydyne may only be a bit stronger static than same-size TEC but it's far more dynamic, I like to use it as my higher-point anchoring with my Safebloc in a lower, final position (when things just happen to line up perfectly lol, I mean "my optimal" or 'what I aim for') But the length inherently affects how far this "rig & ring" type sling can be spread in super convenient fashion, length is better here :D (one of the ends has an "elevation canada" ring which is 10% fatter than regular XL's, too....sometime when I finally slip-up and buy more cordage/hardware, another XL elevation ring and Bloc, and 7/8 TEC & p.dyne, will be making some 1-and-done anchors!!)

When I set my blocks with a loopie or whoopie I try an snug it up tight but sometimes I get lazy and there is some siop, it still works fine.
When you say "it still works fine", you mean you don't notice difference if snubbing loads that way? If running it that's fine but I'm also/primarily talking about snubbing a load, or you mean that even then the difference between 'optimal snug' and 'kinda slack' is still so small it's irrelevant minutiae? (apologies if the latter!! Am kinda working my way up with solo rigging, in terms of piece-size or rather in terms of peak-forces, bought a very complete/comprehensive (and super heavy-duty) rigging kit "to grow into" and finally getting lots of great opportunities to try more things in more ways, for a 'practice tree' I"m doing now I'm, ideally, going to take the top, snubbing it, and then directing/controlling it on a controlled-slideline system (by myself/from tree, have also been practicing angles-of and types-of cuts and 'fall techniques' for branches, but yeah I'm mostly interested in solo-rigging as I prefer being alone even if it means setting a ton of friction and taking largest pieces I reasonably can / working longer, I randomly have a free groundie tomorrow for a regular slideline job but that's not my practice-tree where, when using this whoopie a few days ago, was totally 'testing snugness' (was taking the tail and doing an extra wrap around the Bloc's spliced throat, as-if it'd protect/buffer it from the other end's eye or something :P )
 
I don't think you want polydyne on any X Rigging Rings and especially not on the Safebloc. Cordage is what holds the rings and Safebloc in proper orientation. Stretch a bit much and the ring pops out, rigging line instantly burns through sling.

(I was aware that T-Rex was abandoned for use on Safebloc slings early on because it allowed a little too much slack during use.)

I know some people use and love polydyne for stretch in overall line - not in a sling.
 
IMO if the block is set loose or tight it will still catch the load it's all about stretch in the rigging line, stretch in the sling, and how much space there is when the load comes into the system.
Snubbing a load is where you will get the highest shock load and I hardly ever snub a load but there are times when it is necessary usually with trunk wood over targets. In that situation I keep the block up tight to the trunk and the first half hitch close together it allows less "free fall slack"before the chunk is caught. Personally I avoid snubbing when ever possible.
 
Not talking regular blocks though. If an eye is a little loose around a ring/ thimble/ SafeBlock or if the eye is stretchy, it can come out of the splice, possibly with catastrophic consequences.

Whoopies are ok for a portawrap on the ground, but I hate screwing with them on a spar. Give me an ultrasling or a deadeye.
 
Yeah the loopies and whoopies are a pain in the tree. I have to chase them around the tree several times on the ground. I've been using Ultra slings lately and really like them. If I need it tied off really close I'll use a dead eye. I can tie a cow hitch on a dead eye quicker than I can get the whoopie tight. I have to study it a few seconds to see what to pull on.
 
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My loopies are great on the pines i am rigging down. Climb up to about 6-8" wood, set block and line. Down to lower limbs. Many limbs. Then catch the top on it. Dead eye while blocking down. Loopie for gin pole action. I like them if i am not moving them for the most part. Dead eyes are better for multiple rigging points being moved about.
 
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  • #12
I don't think you want polydyne on any X Rigging Rings and especially not on the Safebloc. Cordage is what holds the rings and Safebloc in proper orientation. Stretch a bit much and the ring pops out, rigging line instantly burns through sling.
I know you're a very respected veteran but this is something I immediately wonder "Has that actually happened?" because of a couple reasons:
- I've got the 3-ring, 6' "x sling", you could pop its rings since it was new or near-new (you have to fight them, but you can remove/reinsert them)
- the stretch-increase (from TEC's 1.4% to p.dyne's 3.5%), on the rope that goes-around the ring, in a 10%ABS scenario would equal just millimeters of increased-stretch, it's hard to think this is of consequence when considering that (for instance if we say 10" of cordage is spliced onto one XL and that ring then gets slammed with 10%ABS of the cordage's strength, the polydyne sling will stretch an extra 5mm over the TEC, the TEC would've stretched 3.55mm and the polydyne 8.8mm, this doesn't seem at all a serious enough reason to change cordage) VERY curious Re T-Rex because it's elasticity is quite comparable to TEC's, I know they're unlikely to exist but would love seeing a Bloc pulled-from its splice in this manner (I'd intended to get a 2nd Bloc but my understanding is the triple-thimble has a deeper sling-groove which could very well change my purchase to that :P )
I know some people use and love polydyne for stretch in overall line - not in a sling.
Oh yeah!! Love my p.dyne, use 1/2 and 5/8 for most things :) Re "Not in a sling", to be clear you mean "Not spliced-hardware slinging", not something new, right? I ask because I also have some 3/4 pdyne "log-wrap" slings, no hardware just "eye&eye" slings for wrapping logs (to then clip to my line / knotless rigging)
 
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  • #13
Not talking regular blocks though. If an eye is a little loose around a ring/ thimble/ SafeBlock or if the eye is stretchy, it can come out of the splice, possibly with catastrophic consequences.

Whoopies are ok for a portawrap on the ground, but I hate screwing with them on a spar. Give me an ultrasling or a deadeye.
It's funny because I'd initially had the Bloc on the p.dyne deadeye, then a TEC one, now a TEC whoopie :P

For deadeyes with these types of slings I just use a basic cow-hitch, kinda rhetorical question but wanna verify, the cow-hitch seems to allow less slop than any other knot because of how you can "wrap&lift" the hardware with extra sling-tail..what knot(s) do you guys use for setting rings/Blocs?
 
Kind of you to refer to me as respected cerberus. My wife would challenge you, AND my opinions, on that point.

I will differ to you and others judgment on the idea of using poly for slings and ring slings. (Your slings, that is. :) )
 
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  • #15
Kind of you to refer to me as respected cerberus. My wife would challenge you, AND my opinions, on that point.

I will differ to you and others judgment on the idea of using poly for slings and ring slings. (Your slings, that is. :) )
This concept began bothering me when considering my 3-ringed x-sling, and how - OEM configuration - it's expected that the rings "squish" each other, and how I've always thought that 3/4TEC is too-large for a Lrg x-ring's sling-groove....so made a dedicated thread on the splicerack subforum on Buzz *Anyone* have some anecdotes on popped-hardware? (IE a Safebloc, rigging-rings etc 'escaping' the splice they're in) - https://www.treebuzz.com/forum/threads/anyone-have-some-anecdotes-on-popped-hardware-ie-a-safebloc-rigging-rings-etc-escaping-the-splice-theyre-in.43714/
included pics but you can definitely slide the rings in&out of my pre-made x-sling (including the XL, I popped it out for use in my eye&eye double-xl's sling) but certainly none of my other slings including the TEC Safebloc whoopie I made:
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I could remove/reinsert these pretty easily, they've been like that since the TEC had its brief period of the Samthane looking all purdy & new...I guess I just picture dislodgement requiring not only an obscene lateral force, but for that force to 'beat' the downward / bottom-of-hardware force accumulation that begins rapidly as a piece is caught (it's that initial movement of a falling piece that is the concern right, like somehow there's some sideways bounce before the anchor has righted itself?)
 
Maybe it's possible with a weird shape of the crotch like a valley, bump, branch collar... where the ring can't free hang in the air but lays somewhat partially sideway or stops its movement during the loading. I fussed my brand new rigging rope with a block by side loading it because something prevented the block to find its dandling position.

For the whoopy's tail, I guess it can be used like a separate rope, but be aware that if you pull the tail, the outside rope could lose its snugness on the buried part. Annoying (at least) or not, it depends of the scenario.
 
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