As you might recall, I questioned the old “Mind the Gap” rule of safer rope placement (‘The Gap’ is the dip between the muscles on the outside of my arm above the red dot in the right hand image below) some while ago after blindly believing it myself for many years. I’m now convinced that, whilst …
I was inspired by the furore between a friend of mine and various others about some nit-picking over his takate-kote tutorial (below) to look back at my own with a critical eye. Well, I’m glad I did as I had a lot to add and there are quite a few things that I would change …
We decided to conduct some rather Heath Robinson tests to determine the loadings on the two wraps of a t-k during suspension. We always knew some orientations like face-downs with the legs pulled up high near the axis of suspension produced crushing constriction on the upper wrap but not relatively how much or how much …
It struck me recently that the only information we have on the loading of the wraps of a box-tie is anecdotal and we take it largely on trust that the inverted-Y is usually the best way of attaching a suspension line. I have speculate elsewhere that it might actually distribute load better if both wraps …
I spent this afternoon photographing and documenting the 30 steps of my own box-tie this afternoon. It is the culmination of a series of experiments to come up with a version that doesn’t use conventional cinches, yet has sufficient stability and benefits from the comfort factor of an extra upper wrap. Why did I bother? …
I recently ran intermediate and advanced courses in which I taught the standard OS TK (actually more correctly called a ‘gote or ‘gote shibari as it does not exhibit the typical ‘high hand’ position) and revised the tie with those who professed to know it. Almost all of those who already had a good idea …