Elasticity of rigging cord

[Tony Bell 2Participant @tonybell2]

I hve designed my own ropewalk where I can alter the diameter of rope and its characteristics using cotton, linen, hemp and polyester yarns

After many tests I realised I had not looked at rope's elasticity. As my pile of test samlpes grew I noticed that some were very limp and some were stiff.

My latest build is 1/10 Jolie Brise, this grew from 1/20 off plans and originally a 1/50 scale kit. I noticed the difficulty of getting ropes to sit sweetly around blocks and cleats or the shrouds looked saggy.

No online supplier specifies hard or soft rope

Video of my machine and full details at **LINK**

"Ropewalk Machine part 2 – Rope elasticity" shows my testing methods to see how varions material elongated over load.

The graphs show a marked difference between materials and axial tension during manufacture.

FYA Ropes can be stiffened by hanging a 2Kg weight on the end.

My question is

Should manufactures state "Hard" or "soft"?

Should there a way of specifying rope's elongation such as 1.5% at 250g.?

Does it really matter, is there an actual problem?

Your thoughts and experiencies would be appreciated

Tony

[Tony Bell 2Participant @tonybell2]

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