Page 57 - Randy Penn Everything Knots Book

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THE EVER YTHING KNOTS BOOK

a sailboat, where the Figure Eight Knot is used for this purpose. It
also stops the end of thread from passing through cloth and sim-
ilar materials in needlework.
A simple stopper knot is often used to make cordage easier to
grasp, whether you make it with the string doubled through the end
of a zipper, or with larger rope to get a better grip. Several stopper
knots can be tied, and spaced out, to give many handholds. When
tied in the end of many cords as if all one cord, it provides a way
to keep them gathered.

FACT

Some knots with different names and uses are really the same
knot tied under different circumstances. Many loop knots are
tied the same as other knots but around their own standing
part. The Double Overhand Knot is called the Strangle Knot
when it is tied over two crossed sticks, and the Strangle Snare
when it is tied around its own standing part.

More Than Just for Stopping
There are many other uses for stopper knots. They can make
the end heavier to use for throwing. Heaving knots are for
weighting the end of a rope to assist with throwing the rope. Often
a smaller rope is thrown between a boat and the dock, and then
used to pull a heavier one over. The same technique is used in
many circumstances to get a heavy rope in a hard-to-reach place.
In getting a rope over and between two particular branches high
in a tree, a rope can be thrown over all of them, and then another
can be thrown across it between the branches, from a different
angle, 90 degrees if possible. In this manner, the second rope will
pull the first down between the two branches. Two common knots
for weighting the end of a line are the Heaving Line Knot and the
Monkey’s Fist.

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