Page 296 - The Ashley Book of Knots

BELAYING AND MAKING FAST

either be very close to deck or else so open that bare toes will not

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be pinched under them. It is preferable to have cleats fixed to houses
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and masts and at an angle with the lead.

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The cleat pictured was made about 1800. More recent deck cleats \ 636

are tapered instead of being square-horned. On coastwise vessels,

both sail and steam, and on scows, barges and canal boats, large iron

deck cleats are common. They are also much used on modem cement

wharfs, which have little piling to make fast to. But on deep-sea

sailing craft they are not often seen. Clear decks are needed for the

day's work and deck cleats are very apt to foul running rigging.

1636. A combined thumb and pinch cleat of bronze has been used

for jib sheets.

1642

1637. A bronze rocker cleat is made for a similar purpose. It re-

quires very few turns and no hitch, as the pull of the sail clamps the

forward horn hard down on the turn of the sheet.

1638. For small craft a mainsheet cleat is sometimes fitted with a , &43

hole. A FIGURE-EIGHT KNOT is put in the end of the sheet to prevent

unreeving. The illustration shows an early example.

1639. This illustrates horn cleat jIj? 1633, in use on the davit of a \640 1614

whaler.

1641

1640. A thumb cleat on the side of the davit serves as a fair-leader

to keep the fall from fouling the whaleboat.

1641. The shoe cleat is somewhat similar in form to jIj? 1642, but

it does not have the "norman," as the iron crossbar is termed. The

one given here is copied from Roding (1795).

1642. The ram's-head cleat is an old form that is now being re-

vived. It is used to make fast a schooner's halyards.

1643. A loggerhead in the stern of a whaleboat is the means of

snubbing and also holding fast the whale line with a series of round

turns.

1644. As an iceboat has no deck, it is important that all coils \646

should be fixed. This method of belaying exhausts the halyard and

serves the double purpose of coiling and belaying. It was pictured

and described by 6hrvall in Om Knutar in 1916, and is found on lake

scows and other light racing craft.

1645. A thumb cleat is sometimes used as a fair-leader at the fife

rail.

1646. A chock is commonly used to provide a proper lead for

various heavy warps. 164S"

1647. A fair-leader with "rollers" serves the same purpose with less

friction.

1648. A single bitt with a norman (an iron crossbar) is often used

for the mainsheet bitts of a small schooner. S turns are taken on bitts

exactly as on cleats and pins, only, of course, horizontally. A similar

bitt forward is often placed on small motor craft for the "anchor

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warp."

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1649. A mainsheet bitt may have a mortised oak cleat which takes

the place of the norman. This is commonly found on fishermen. '65"0 e
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1650. Double bitts were formerly mortised with a similar cleat.

On schooners main- and foresheets were made fast to them, and, 011

square-riggers, sheets and braces.