Marlingspike & Heaver hitch videos

[Clyderigged]

Here is a quick video I made on using a heaving mallet to apply tension to cordage or other small stuff using the Heaver hitch. It is very handy when clapping on a seizing or for ratling down. The heaver hitch is just a easy to use as a marlingspike hitch, but with much more power & leverage it is the hitch I perfer to use.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=af4RISRCrrI

Here is one on making a "marlingspike hitch"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_yqNUi7_qU

[Woxbox]

Nicely done. I see you prefer "marlingspike" as the spelling. Are you thinking everyone should go that route?

[George Ray]

William Falconer's Dictionary of the Marine
http://southseas.nla.gov.au/refs/falc/0849.html

MARLING-SPIKE, (epissoir, Fr.) an iron pin, tapering, to a point, and furnished with a large round head. It is principally used to penetrate the twists, or strands of a rope, in order to introduce the ends of some other through the intervals, in the act of knotting or splicing.

It is also used as a lever, on many other occasions, about the rigging, particularly in fixing the feizings upon the shrouds, block-strops, clues of the sails, &c.


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http://www.dictionary.net/marling+spike

Marline \Mar"line\, n. [LG. marlien, marling, or D. marling, marlijn, fr. D. marren to tie, prob. akin to E. moor, v., and lijn line: cf.F. merlin. See Moor, v., Line.]

(Naut.) A small line composed of two strands a little twisted, used for winding around ropes and cables, to prevent their being weakened by fretting.

Marline spike, Marling spike (Naut.), an iron tool tapering to a point, used to separate the strands of a rope in splicing and in marling. It has an eye in the thick end to which a lanyard is attached. See Fid. [Written also marlin spike]

Marline-spike bird. [The name alludes to the long middle tail feathers.]

(Zo["o]l.)
(a) A tropic bird.
(b) A jager, or skua gull.

Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)


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http://www.2020site.org/knots/blackwallhitch.html

Marling Spike Hitch
(Fig 17)

Lay the end a over c; fold the loop over on the standing part b; then pass the marling spike through, over both parts of the bight and under the part b. Used for tightening each turn of a seizing.
http://www.2020site.org/knots/images/knots6.gif

[Clyderigged]

Boy, there are so many ways to spell marlin, marline, marlingspike. The only spike I know spelled one way was the old shellback, Spike Africa, President off the Pacific Ocean.

I prefer marlingspike~probaly my 18th Century traditional rigging bias :D

[Thorne]

Yes, it is always fun to shout, "Hard t'larboard!" when sailing small boats at 16th-18th C. historical reenactments and see the startled looks on the faces of sailors used to more new-fangled terms...

[Clyderigged]

Ah yes, Thorne ~ one of my favorite commands when setting studding sails is "stand by the starboard main topmast studding sail boom tricing line" :D. Probably one of the longer nautical terms going.

[Clyderigged]

It is interesting that in Falconer, Steele, Lever, and other British rigging authorities use "marlingspike". On this side of the Atlantic, Richard Henry Dana in "The Seaman's Friend" 1851, used the term "marlingspike". Even ole Clifford Ashley in the seminal work "Ashley Book of Knots" has a passage at the beginning of the Chapter on Odd Splices

"A sailor made a bargain with the devil. He was to have ten years of affluence, but at the end of that time his soul would go to the devil unless he could provide some task that the devil himself could not perform. When the time for payment came, the sailor was at his wit's end, but at his wife's suggestion he put a marlingspike in the grate until it grew red hot, then, pulling a hair from his wife's head, he invited the devil to splice the hair with the hot marlingspike. The story has it that the devil failed."

I guess Hervey G. Smith was really breaking with tradition when he titled his book "Marlinspike Sailor"
Any other ideas out there???

[J. Dillon]

Jamie , Love those billowing sails on your site. They rival some bosoms. ;) Thanks for the video's and BTW happy belated birthday.

JD

[Woxbox]

Well, It seems to me that "marlinspike" is the most common current spelling, but looking around to confirm that, I'm only seeing Hervey Garrett Smith as an authority spelling it that way.

My old copy of Chapmans uses "marlinespike," but curiously at the tops of the pages in that chapter, it says "marlinspike" on the left-hand pages, and "marlinespike" on the right-hand pages.

And then there's George Biddlecombe's "The Art of Rigging," in which he prefers "marline spike."

So maybe the issue has not yet been decided. Around the Kalmar Nyckel, they're just "spikes."

[Vince Brennan]

Heck. How did I miss this thread? I'd LOVE to see more videos out of you as time goes along... great way to pass along the knowledge!

Thanks so much!

V

[Steve Lansdowne]

Thanks. Fast and informative. Can you post these on the main WB site where there are videos, or is that section not for this particular type of videos?

[almeyer]

What Vince said. That was a great video, thanks for sharing. I learned something today.
Al

[Hughman]

Well done, Jamie!

[Chan]

Great stuff....nice spike!

[Kim Whitmyre]

Jamie, can you direct me to any info on rigging deadyes? Specifically, the tightening process?

Thx,