Safety essentials - lifeline

One day up at Dux it was something like 18-25’ x 20+ seconds and out on the reef it was enormous

I swam twice and one of them the yak was straight down 15’ under me and yanking my arm out of my shoulder The scary part was when it shot back up in front of me

That was maybe 75lbs between the yak and gear and it did a serious number on my shoulder

I bought shock cord to do something like this, but just need to figure out the best way to stitch it into the hollow braid

Shock cord stuffed into the hollow braid

I’m tempted to buy one of the manufactured ones like the one above to figure out how they fixed the ends inside the hollow braid

I tried stitching one end but result was unsatisfactory

Anybody has any ideas about how to attach the shock cord ends inside the hollow braid chime in

Anybody has any ideas about how to attach the shock cord ends inside the hollow braid chime in

What about a loop of shock cord so there are loops at both ends to tie into?

That would probably work

On the end I didn’t stitch I just looped it out and made a knot to hold it there

The main problem I can see is wherever you attach an end it pulls the braid open when you stretch it. Not necessarily a problem maybe. Im sure there’s some simple solution

I’ll ask my sailor cousin about it

When we were contemplating getting a TI this was the first thing I figured I’d need to add

Might be overkill adding the shock cord but with the heavier yaks it’ll save a lot of pain

Not totally sure I understand what your trying to do but if your intending to string the shock cord through the hollow braid and want a way to secure it at the ends.......I think you could run your shock cord though hollow braid tie knots in the ends then pull the knot back to where your fed splice is going to branch, do your splice and then wrap a bunch of tight loops of heavy thread around the both lines at that point. The knot would keep the cord from springing back from the ends of the hollow braid.

How about using a Bungee Dock Line?  You can extend the line by adding an additional length rope or get a long bungee dock line.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000276CZS?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_11&th=1

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07F34D6TQ/ref=syn_sd_onsite_desktop_0?ie=UTF8&pd_rd_plhdr=t&aref=qvGLpZScsA&th=1

Look up hownot2 on youtube
Also if you're patient,  you could remove the outter sleeve and separate the strands of stretch cord and weave them into the braided rope...
Also tapering the ends to slowly taper the burry.

Tsuri - not sure im picturing what youre saying right but I’ll try to sort that out

Paul - none of the dock lines ive looked at seem right for yaks, the closest is the black one above. The basic yellow version i use is good enough in most situations and simple to make Having some stretch would just be easier on the shoulder

Clb I’ll look at that

Thanks for all the inputs I’ll keep playing with it til i figure it out. Problem is i may have to buy a TI to go with it

I've seen some applications like you are trying to do, but most use the nylon webbing sleeves for the line, instead of a hollow braided line. The dock lines are a good example.

I think they mostly use that because they can stitch that material easily while maintaining the "bunch" of outer material to create the shock property. That, and it tends to be super durable and abrasion resistant, which is good for stuff like dock lines. I haven't taken one apart, but they also probably use flat shock cord too, which also probably makes stitching easier.

For using round hollow line, you might attach something to your shock cord, like maybe stitch a patch of nylon strap to each end. The idea is to give you something to stitch onto inside your braided line. You could probably add some glue to increase adhesion between nylon stitch patch and shock cord, to make sure it stays put. Then, feed it fully into your braid, stitch one end, bunch the line around it, and stitch the other end. I would use polyester sail thread or upholstery thread, for durability and UV/water protection.

?atv kinetic recovery rope?

Anybody has any ideas about how to attach the shock cord ends inside the hollow braid chime in

Most of the time, to add shock absorption to hollow braid, a rubber shock absorber is inserted into the braid and the braid squishes on it to absorb the shock.  Here's an example of what one looks like outside the braid:


One large-scale example of this is the Cobra tree cabling system (this is an 8 ton breaking strength system):

That looks like what they maybe did in the pic of the black line above. Hard to tell from that picture but doesn't look like there’s any stitching on it

One of the objectives is to keep it light which is why I was thinking bungee/shock cord

All of my yaks are pretty light and I don’t load much into them so it’s only going to be a thing if I buy something heavier like a TI

I will do surf launching and I did that so long I could do it blindfolded

My original was lightweight and didn’t have a rudder so it could just tumble in the surf without damage

The Tarpon and Stealth have rudders so need better control