Amsteel loops and shackles.

[Indysailor]

I've been experimenting with 3/16 Amsteel line, making loops and soft shackles. The loops are especially handy. Shown here are loops for a prusik bend on the toppling lift, as a pendant for the head sail and as a soft fairlead for the furling line, attached to the stanchion base.
It will be interesting to see how that one works out over the season, whether the furling line will continue to glide smoothly through it. I haven't used the shackles yet, but I am thinking about them for attaching the genoa sheets to the clew.

This line is very easy to work with. From what I can tell, knotting it is problematic because it is so slippery, but its quite easy to splice.

View attachment 88066

 

[rardiH36]

Agree Amsteel line is a great product for alternative solutions to standard line or stainless steel fittings.

Thanks for sharing your ideas/pics. To assist your thread's continuation, here's mine:

I had in my bone yard collection a high-end Harken double-block and also a older roller bearing Frederiksen Series 60 single. One day it occured to me I could cobble them together into a triple to upgrade my old standard nylon sheave triple (no roller bearings) mainsheet block. An Amsteel loop enabled a nice strong connection to the traveler, since my homemade triple didn't have a center-located shackle attachment point.

 

[thinwater]

Nice.

a. Isn't Amsteel a bit slippery for the Prusic applications?

b. You can also use single braid polyester, or just the cover of a polyester line to make similar constructions, when the strength of Dyneema is irrelevant.

 

[Indysailor]

Nice. a. Isn't Amsteel a bit slippery for the Prusic applications? b. You can also use single braid polyester, or just the cover of a polyester line to make similar constructions, when the strength of Dyneema is irrelevant.

I didn't think it would hold on the topping lift and originally had added another turn to the Prusik.
But so far it's holding just fine.