rope "snails" or not...

[martin schulz]

I don't know if this special way to lay down rope is really called "snails" but I guess you get the picture.

http://classics.robbeberking.de/2005/Impressionen/RK05RB7949_Catina_466.jpg

Now, I consider this plain bric-a-brac, redundant and unnecessary. But I come from a more workboat background. My Grandpa who was a carpenter at the Hamburg Howald Shipyard would have laughed his arse off seeing me laying rope-snails on my boat.

Opinions?

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Known in Britain and aboard British ships as a Flemish coil and we even have the verb "to Flemish" a rope.

Only ever done for show, in port, as it puts too many turns into the rope, so the rope won't render through the blocks until it has been re-coiled normally.

Generally an indication that the crew don't have enough to do...but I can't say I've never done it.

It's not a good way to leave a rope, as the rain water collects dirt under the coil, but fun to do at a rally or something.

[Ron Williamson]

FIL gets my kids to do it,so that no one trips over the pile of line.
No mention ever,of tripping over the cleats or the tangled shore power cord. tongue.gif
R

[Figment]

Unnecessary bric-a-brac is right.

Around my marina it's usually done by the same guys who take six or seven locking hitches on the dock cleats. You know.... so that departing the dock takes at least half an hour.... so they have one more excuse to not leave the dock.... so they can have time to get that flemish coil looking juuuuuust right.... :rolleyes:

Instead of a coil that looks as if it's meant to be scooped off the deck with a spatula like a pancake, I prefer a coil that can be picked up by one hand in one motion. A coil that can run through a block or a chock without hockling itself into oblivion.

[Tom Lathrop]

I agree with the consensus on this one. Just pretty over practical. I sometimes have crew that attempts to neatly coil the off jib sheet before I stop them. That generates the same problem of insuring hockles at the fairleads. Best way to get a free running line is to lie it down or coil it in figure eights so that each turn alternately adds or subtracts a half rotation of the line.

[George.]

I often do that to my jib and jib topsail sheets, while steering. It is easy. It is neat. It looks good. It makes a comfortable pad to sit on. And what else is there to do between long tacks?

BTW, I do not lay the whole rope down that way. I just start the coil, and then spin it under my palm. Piece of cake.

[Ian McColgin]

Those flemished lines were done backwards. At least in the Northern Hemisphere.

When done from the bitter end towards a cleat or such, about the only way is, as Goeorge described, to rotate the coil. It's mostly decorative but can serve well to handle a little bit of bitter end laying on a dock. Keeps the extra from so readily tripping strollers. But made up this way, a longish bit will kink rather than run smoothly.

There is a practical flemish. A big ship's line or other tow line not wound up on a drum is flemished in tiers alternating clockwise and anticlockwise to prevent kink build-up.

Flemishing is about the only way to lay down a long heavy line in a way that will both stay put and will run readily. The carefuly way a harpoon line (or more modernly a lead line or long heaving line) is laid in buckets is really just compact stacked flemishing.

So, it does have its uses.

[bamamick]

I have never done that once in my life, but at a recent race in the Dragon my crew did it when tying the boat up for the night and I must admit that it gave me a feeling of silly pride in how the boat looked very ship-shape when we left it.

In other words, it does look like the crew of the boat takes a little extra care when you see something like that. I always try to stow my lines off of the deck, so it's not something that I'll ever do, but it loos o.k.

Mickey Lake

[Brian Palmer]

On the schooner Shenandoah (100 ft LOD) that is done as a matter of course with all the halyards so that when sails are lowered the halyards run cleanly through their blocks. You are talking about a couple hundred feet of halyard for the peak and throat on the main and fore. The mate and bosun would get kind of cranky if there were a kink or knot in the line jambed against a pin at the rail and everything had to stop to clear it.

To get a proper coil the line is actually coiled twice. After the first coil (a simple coil with the bitter end on the bottom), it is flipped over and the flemish coil is started with the bitter end on the bottom and it ends with the standing end (going to the belaying pin) on top.

[martin schulz]

Over here the Navy does it on their sailboats, probably a matter of having too much time ;)

[John B]

The kids do it to the jib sheets.

[mmd]

I agree re: Flemish coils developing kinks in the line & causing problems in running rigging. I will certainly not think of debating a fellow with commercial tug experience regarding coiling heavy lines. However, I am prepared to rise to the defense of Flemish coils in dealing with the excess line on deck from anchor lines and mooring lines. They not only look nice, but are comfortable under bare feet and are less likely to get snarled from an occasional toe-stubbing.

[John E Hardiman]

Short term for looks they're OK.

Long term, they rot and stain the decks.

[Donn]

Chapman sez:

"The flemish coil....deals decoratively with the free end of a dock line or anchor line. It's easy to do and looks yachtlike, but if you leave it too long the coil will pick up dirt and moisture and leave a soiled mark on deck when it's taken up."

[Ian McColgin]

Chapman was a small boat guy who also touted one of the slower ways to tie a bowline.

I may not have been wholly clear about the utility of the two different ways to Flemish a line.

Little ends like a dock line or a bit of topping lift that lives on the coach roof against a grab rail are often flemished by taking the bitter end as the center and rotating to coil it up. This is neat and quick for short bits but it leaves kinks in the line as it's pulled out, just as you'll kink a line if you pull it off a drum by pulling parallel with the axis and not letting the drum turn.

As with coiling, the only way to prevent harmful kinking is to work from the standing part to the bitter end. The description of Shenedoah doing this by capsizing the line makes some sense, though in my own case when knocking down say 300' of hallyard on Clearwater, I had a kid doing the flemishing whilest the rest of us hoisted, so it was proper all the while.

You'll feel in the line when you've made enough turns in one direction and you need to make a new tier in the other.

Another pet buggabear of mine is the number of dock hands around here who think water hoses should be tightly coiled rather than generously figure eighted.

[Donn]

"Another pet buggabear of mine is the number of dock hands around here who think water hoses should be tightly coiled rather than generously figure eighted." An across-the-canal neighbor stores ~200' of garden hose on one of those tightly wound crank-up hose reels. You should see that stuff when he lets it out. :D

Is it just me, or is that pic at the top of the thread a stunner? The squabble between diagonals and circles is intense.

[John E Hardiman]

Originally posted by Donn:

Is it just me, or is that pic at the top of the thread a stunner? The squabble between diagonals and circles is intense.The block mat needs to be bigger.... ;)