Slipped Bowline?

[Rob Hazard]

Does anyone here have experience with tying a bowline "slipped",i.e., with a short bight in the final tuck (where the rabbit goes back in the hole)?
I was fooling with it today. It seems stable and comes undone with a yank on the tag end. But I can't find it in Ashley and I don't know if it's a knot that can be trusted.

Any knotheads out there?

[Mike Field]

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No reason why it wouldn't work, Rob. But for sheer magic of undoingness, I like the pirate's or highwayman's hitch best. (I don't think it's in Ashley, but I haven't searched religiously.)
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[Jack Heinlen]

But I can't find it in Ashley and I don't know if it's a knot that can be trusted. Trusted for what? As long as the bitter end isn't subject to snagging it should be secure.

I'm no expert, but imagine Ashley doesn't include it for the good reason that a regular bowline doesn't jam, is easy to break open, and is very secure.

What would you use it for? A reef knot with a slip in the final tuck comes to mind for loops you want to be immediately undone, ala reef points.

[Tomcat]

I certainly wouldn't want to climb a mountain like that. I agree with Jack that since the big advantage is that you can break open a bowline anyway, why bother.

Meanwhile, if I understand what you are doing, depending on the stiffness of the rope it would tend to cause the material to open. I once looked down at the bowline on my harness (no backup knot) just as I was about to go over an overhanging section (checking my feet presumably) and found the "rabbit" had gone back around the "tree". Not a warm feeling.

When you load a bowline, the hole constricts on the rabbit run part so your slip probably wouldn't be easy to undo (sorry I don't know all the component terms) and you would end up undoing the knot conventionaly anyway.

I was surprise to learn at the woodenboat school, that they moored all their boats with a simple bowline, from my end of the thing that didn't seem secure. I can see the appeal of just yanking on the slip to get away, but I won't be doing it myself.

[Bill Perkins]

Not quite the same thing ,but the soundest slipknot I've used is a slipped Buntline Hitch .This is in Ashley,and comes off very cleanly under load ,while being very secure .

[Ian McColgin]

Almost any knot can be made slippery. I've used a slippery bowline in mountaineering on some long rappels where there was not enough main climbing rope to be doubled for the pitch. Having anticipated that, I had plenty of parachute cord to bend on the protruding end of the knot. It did take some tugging to shake loose but the scheme worked. Sure was better to have only 100m of kernmantle and 100m of light stuff.

There is no normal need for a slippery bowline as the slip loop does not facilitate releasing the knot if you can actually get your hands on the knot, only useful for remote release if the line is not under load at the time of release (bowlines don't undo under load anyway) and if the line was not subject to a jerking strain that makes it too tight to pull the loop through.

[Scott Rosen]

Most of all, I'd be interested to know what you plan to use that knot for.

I'm with Ian. A bowline can't really be tied or untied when the rope is under a load.

[Tomcat]

Sure if it's loaded it's not going to give up the slip, but the mooring example is a good one, it would not be significantly loaded, and it would be more convenient. Whether it would be secure would require some testing.

[Rob Hazard]

Suppose you have your boat in a slip, moored to pilings. It would certainly be easier to cast off if you could release the mooring lines with one hand, hanging on for dear life with the other, no?

Reliable one-handed release is a definate advantage at times. That's why the reef knot is commonly slipped. With both hands free it's easy enough to capsize a reef knot into a cow hitch and let it go, but slipped it's just a one handed tug.

[Rob Hazard]

I just dug out "The Rigger's Apprentice", by Brion Toss. A quick look through the index brought a reference to a "slipknot bowline" but it turned out to be just another slick way to tie a bowline!

However, on page 44 he writes,"There are so many more bowlines, made on or with a bight,_slipped_, from round turns...", so it HAS been thought of before...

[Jack Heinlen]

Suppose you have your boat in a slip, moored to pilings. It would certainly be easier to cast off if you could release the mooring lines with one hand, hanging on for dear life with the other, no?
I'm still wondering about the security of the knot un-loaded. Do you want to put a boat in a slip and walk away with the thought niggling that the bitter end my snag or, as mentioned above, with synthetic line might just, without a load, work loose?

My experience with boat slips has always been in places with minimal current, though with wind as a factor at times. Even alone, getting the boat ready, starting the motor if it had one, then untying lines and jumping aboard always worked fine. In a slip with four lines to pilings, reaching to bitter ends to tug them?...I don't know, the knot my be useful in some circumstances, but I can't think of one at the moment.

[Ian McColgin]

I believe mooring lines should be arranged to easy casting off. This often means no bowlines at all. Most of the time even a slippery bowline takes two hands to undo and was really tied because there was a lot of line and the person making the knot did not know how to do a bowline on a bight.

My own preference whether to a piling or a cleat is simply to pass the line around and back to the boat such that both ends are onboard. Then adjustment or casting off can be done from deck. A properly made cleat know will always come off easily. It may be neater to have one end of each mooring line an eye splice. Put that on the cleat, over to shore and back tieing the cleat knot over the eye on the same cleat.

You may achieve extra security, especially for the breast lines that may be leading normal to the dock cleat's orientation, by making a full turn around the cleat.

For long term moorage, you may want to cast a couple of figure eights but no locking hitch on the dock cleats so that the lines don't move and chafe around the cleat.

In tidal areas you might need a nail or some such that the line can pass around the pile over so the line's held up.

Still no bowlines. My favored attachment to a piling if the line is to be secured at the piling is the 'tuggy's hitch.' After three or four turns around the piling, this hitch is really a cast cleat know where one horn of the cleat is the standing part of the line and the other horn is the top of the piling.

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

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Further to Ian's comment, Sanderling is moored four-square in a mud berth. All her lines are dedicated -- that is, they're cast off and the landward ends remain fast to trees or ashore when she leaves. (They're checked from time to time, of course, particularly after occasions like last weekend's spring tide, reported on elsewhere..)

Two diagonally opposite lines are made up with eye-splices that are dropped over a quarter-cleat and the foredeck's samson-post respectively. The other stern line is belayed on the other quarter-cleat, while the second bow-line is made fast to the samson-post with a tugboat hitch, as Ian describes.

This arrangement allows me to keep the boat in the same place, while hauling and veering a trifle on the two adjustable lines orients her to the shore so that she always stays on a level footing.

Mike

http://www.woodenboatfittings.com.au/public/mud-berth.jpg
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