Bowline
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Bowline.jpg
Canonical Name: Bowline (pronounced "bow -lin" or "bow -line")
Variant name(s): Death knot, Rescue knot.
Category: Loop on the end.
Origin: This is an ancient knot and is considered the 'King of Knots'.
Related knot(s): double bowline, water bowline, Spanish bowline, triple bowline, Portuguese bowline, bowline on a bight, Irish bowline, running bowline.
Releasing: Non-jamming.
Efficiency: 60-75%
Caveats: None.
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Uses
- Commonly used in sailing small craft, for example to fasten a halyard to the head of a sail.
- The Federal Aviation Administration recommends the bowline knot for tying down light aircraft.
- Commonly referred to as the rescue knot because it is used to lift people out of dangerous situations.
Comments
After learning the overhand knot and the figure-of-eight knot, the bowline is the next most useful and easy to learn knot. Many people are taught the slow and all thumbs 'Bunny' method. In fact it can be very fast to tie even under the most difficult of circumstances.
There are many 'loop on the end' knots. Like the others the bowline can be made and then secured over an object like a post. But many other loop knots are unlike the Bowline. The working end can first be passed through a ring object and then tied. This unique feature of the Bowline makes it a convenient loop knot and a knot every one should master. One bowline tied through another is one way of joining two ropes.
Perhaps a bit of overzealousness on one knot-tyer's part, the bowline has the strength in which "the rope will break before the knot comes undone."
John Smith's Seaman's Grammar (published in 1627) is perhaps the first written reference to it, although a "curiously intricate knot…akin to the bowline" was discovered on the rigging of Egyptian Pharaoh Cheops' solar ship during an excavation.
Structure
Tying
Bowline_steps.png
This knot can be tied in a number of ways, including in the air, around an object, and around oneself.
The 'Bunny' method: form the hole (a loop), the bunny comes up through the hole, around the tree, and back down through the hole. This is a difficult and inferior way to tie.
Single hand method: Grasp the free end with the thumb of the dominant hand (leaving some free length) and place the line behind the victim. Cross the free end over the line in front of the victim, then twist the hand under the line and up to form a loop around the wrist. Push the free end around the line, then pull it through the wrist loop.
Lightning (aka Jedi) method: Tie a slip knot with the main line as the adjustable end, pass the working end through the loop and pull the slip knot tight until it flips over. The resulting knot is a bowline.
Lightning_bowline_steps.png
External links
- Grog's Animated Knots: How to tie the bowline (http://www.grogono.com/knot/bowline/index.php?LogoImage=LogoGrog.jpg)
- Bowline article with one-hand twist method (http://www.geocities.com/roo_two/bowline.html)
- FAA Advisory Circular (AC) 20-35C (http://www1.airweb.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Guidance_Library/rgAdvisoryCircular.nsf/ACNumber/3121C979AF8A048C862569D60074B3B3?OpenDocument), "Tiedown Sense." July 12, 1983.de:Palstek
