Outdoor Education 9

The Great Competition

Date of competition: ______

Learn to accurately and quickly tie useful from memory! The student with the most winning times on the knots will win the competition, with a second runner up. Incorrectly tied knots or memory aids will disqualify quickest times.

1st Place - First choice of chocolate bar ​ 2nd Place - Chocolate bar ​

Knots to be Timed: ​

1. Square Knot () The square knot can join 2 of the same size. It is the first knot we learn to make with our shoelaces. It looks like a bow and is hugely unreliable. Its breaking strength is only 45% of the ​ ​ line strength. The simple and ancient binding knot is also known by the names Hercules, Herakles, flat, and reef knots. It helps to secure a line or around an object. It creates unique designs of jewelry.

2. Figure 8 Follow Through Based on the figure 8 knot, figure 8 follow through knot is one of the ways of tying a figure 8 loop the other one being the figure 8 on a . It secures the rope to a harness thereby protecting the climber from an accidental fall.

3. The bowline (pronunciation “boh-lin”) is a knot that can itself be tied at the middle of a rope making a fixed, secure loop at the end of the line. It retains about 60% of the line strength and has a knot efficiency of 77%.

4. Barrel Knot It is a friction knot (or ) meaning that it will self-tighten around the object it is tied to when loaded. Though it is sometimes referred to as the , the tying process is dissimilar. It can be tied to leather and paracord. The has good strength. It is the knot of choice for closing a belay system and preventing the rope end from accidentally feeding through the belay device.

5. Double Fisherman’s Knot The double fisherman’s knot, also known as the grapevine knot uses two double overhand knots in their form, one tied around the standing part of the other. This makes it stronger than the fisherman’s knot. Though mainly used as a bend to join two ropes it can also be tied with the ends of a single rope to make a loop with it. Examples are the and the Prusik loop utilized in tying the . It is used in creating a cordelette to assist rock climbers.

6. Prusik Hitch A Prusik is a knot primarily used to attach a loop of cord to a rope in a way that it can be easily adjusted. Hence it can also be termed as a type of friction hitch. Prone to be misspelled as Prussic, Prusic, Prussik, Prussick and Prusick, the correct spelling can be borne in mind once you know the name of its inventor, Austrian mountaineer Karl Prusik. The knot also has a verb form, known as “to Prusik”.

7. Trucker’s Hitch Do you need to tie down long ropes at your campsite or secure kayaks and canoes to your truck? The trucker’s hitch or power cinch knot could help you with it. It works for long lengths of ropes such as tarp guy-lines or clotheslines. The compound knot that finds mention in The Ashley Book of Knots forms a crude block and tackle system. An easy version is demonstrated in the below step by step.