THE HISTORY OF ROPEMAKING
The history of rope making has undergone four major changes
or revolutions if that word does not sound too dramatic.
These are:
- Hand twisting/braiding;
- Simple mechanical advantage tools;
- Compound mechanical tools;
- Power machinery
The beginning of rope making is lost
in prehistory, but there are evidences of rope being made
as far back as 17,000 BC These early ropes were twisted
by hand or braided. The earliest indication of any type
of mechanical advantage in making rope comes from early
Egyptian evidence relating to the craft.
According to Emily Teeter (Teeter
1987, 71-77) the Egyptians used a weighted rope
tied to a stick to make rope. The rope to be made was
tied to the weighted rope that was spun around the stick.
The spinning imparted a twist to the strand. Three twisted
strands would then be twisted together in the opposite
direction. The idea that the ropes were made using a
weighted rope came from inscriptions. In reality, this
type of a system will not work. It is likely that the
inscriptions were of a static material such as a weighted
wooden dowel, paddle, etc. The dowels may have been
carved to represent rope. A static method does work
well, although it will not make long rope. This is very
similar to the method used by the Southwest Indians
in America about 1,000 AD.
In the Middle Ages (from the thirteenth century to
the eighteenth century), from the British Isles to Italy,
rope was made using a "rope walk" method. This allowed
for long ropes of up to 300 yards long or longer to
be made (Exhibit 1; Sanctuary
1996, 7-13; Lane 1932, 830-847). Short ropes
are useless on tall ships which require ropes to be
long, relatively uniform in diameter, and strong. Short
ropes would require splicing to make them long. The
strongest form of splicing is the short splice, which
doubles the diameter of the rope at the area of the
splice. This would cause problems in the rigging hardware
such as buckles and pulleys.
The actual history of the rope making industry in
medieval times is very scant, to say the least. One
of the most comprehensive works on the history of rope,
ROPE a history of the Hard Fibre Cordage Industry
in the United Kingdom, has very little to say about
the craft during this time period. "In 1393 we have
a representation of the first stage of ropemaking-that
of spinning the yarn-taken from the Mandelshes Portrait
Buch in Nuremburg. So little difference from what was
practiced for the next five hundred years in Europe
is shown that this may serve as a text for a fairly
full description of the art during the period indicated.
(Tyson, 7). The first
real improvement in the craft came with an invention
in 1792 called the Cordelier. (Tyson,
8).
From The Story of Rope, published by the Plymouth
Cordage Company, we learn that, "Coming down to more
recent times we find that rope-making had been going
on for centuries with probably very little change, up
to the time of the introduction of machinery and the
establishment of the factory system." (Plymouth
1931, 19).
Finally, "Yarns, twines and ropes can be made by machine
nowadays, but the ropemakers of older days were accustomed
to making all of these in a walk. The principal of the
walk is that yarns are stretched out between revolving
hooks, often 300 yards apart, and these hooks twist
the yarns together…."
"The layout of a medieval town like Bridport lends
itself well to family rope or twine walks because of
the long narrow alleys which stretch back from the main
streets…a man would make twine and small ropes in the
alleys off the main street with the help of his son,
who turned a wheel to revolve the hooks. For many years
after the introduction of local factories the walk method
continued: indeed the last Bridport walk closed down
only in 1970." (Sanctuary
1996, 9).
MECHANCIAL ADVANTAGE ROPE MAKING
There are two types of mechanical advantage: Simple
and Compound.
SIMPLE MECHANICAL ADVANTAGE
Simple mechanical advantage comes from the use of
some type of tool, which results in one twist in a strand/rope
for one twist in the device. The Egyptian and Southwest
Indian methods are examples of simple mechanical advantage.
A tool more useful to longer rope making would be
the simple jack (Exhibit 2). This tool will make
longer ropes than the Egyptian or Native American Indian
devices. However, it will take some time to accomplish
this feat. The beauty of this system is that the simple
jack could be made cheaply from wood and soft iron,
something almost anyone would have ad access to even
in medieval towns such as BRIDPORT.
COMPOUND MECHANICAL ADVANTAGE
Compound mechanical advantage allows for multiple
twisting of the strands/rope for each turn of the tool.
The multiple compound mechanical tool used to make rope
using the "rope walk" method is called a JACK (Sanctuary
1996, 10). The strands of the rope and then
the rope itself is made when the wheel man turns the
main wheel of the jack which causes the hooks to spin
by means of either a pulley system or by means of a
geared system (Sanctuary 1996,
10).
The earliest JACKS were probably made using a pulley
system. The early jacks appear to have had a large center
wheel, much like a wagon wheel. Every village had a
wheelwright, and such a center wheel would have been
easy to come by. Around the large center wheel there
was a leather or rope belt that was used to link the
large wheel to smaller wheels at the top of the jack
(Exhibit 3; Sanctuary 1996,
8). As the center wheel was revolved once, the
top smaller wheels would turn at a ratio of from 4 to
10 times to one. This would allow for the twisting of
the strands and rope in a much faster manner than the
simple advantage machines. However, make no mistake,
the time needed to string out the yarn and to twist
(or lay) the yarn into strands and then into rope would
still take a long time
Toward the end of the Middle Ages/Renaissance the
pulley machines were replaced by geared machines (Exhibit
4 is an example of the simple geared machines).
The gearing has a major advantage over the pulley machines
in that gears do not slip, do not require adjustment
of the pulleys, and do not suffer broken pulley belts.
However, the gearing also required a more careful fitting,
and the jack gains significantly in weight. The weight
can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on how
portable one wishes the jack to be. In the medieval
period, portability was not an important factor, and
the weight of the jack (especially the flywheel) probably
worked in favor of the wheel turner.
The epitome of the rope jack would probably be represented
in the rope making tools at the beginning of the 19th
Century (1800 AD Exhibit 5) The large iron rope
jack used at Bridport, England at that time had complex
planetary gearing connecting the fly wheel to five spinning
hooks which were used to make up to a five strand rope.
However, normally only three of the hooks would have
been used (Sanctuary 1996,
10-13). A three-strand rope is stronger than
a four or more stranded rope of the same diameter.
In the late 1800s through the 1930s manufacturers
in the United States adapted the large professional
jacks of the period (and earlier periods) and miniaturized
them for individual use (Exhibit 6). These same
rope making machines were generally less than a foot
in diameter and had gear ratios of only about 3 or 4
to 1. However, they were perfect for farmers and ranchers.
Being portable and being able to take advantage of cheap
hemp twine, the farmers/ranchers were able to make rope
when and where they needed it, and they were able to
tailor it to their own specifications. Such machines
were generally made of cast iron. They could make rope
in excess of 100 feet long and up to an inch or more
in diameter. These machines were so well made that they
are often still found in antique stores.
The beauty of these machines or similar machines which
might be made today is that they replicate exactly (although
in a more compact package) the way rope was made in
the medieval times down through about 1970 when the
last Bridport rope walk closed (ibid.
9).
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