Originally Posted By 4evrplan

I've also used the same drop line for my guy lines, and I guess they stretched, because my ridge line was no longer taut.

How would you deal with these issues - guy lines stretching and stake loops unraveling?



Simple, don't use Nylon. Nylon absorbs water and stretches, so your guy lines which seemed tight before the rain got on them, end up loose. Same thing happens for tents with Nylon rain flys...The whole fly ends up sagging. So don't use Nylon webbing either, use Polypropylene webbing instead. Replace your Nylon guy lines with waterproof Dyneema cord instead...It's lighter (floats on water), far stronger (pure Dyneema fibre is 15 times stronger than steel!), and it has virtually zero stretch, even when wet, so your guy lines will always stay taut. Dyneema cord comes in two types...The first type has a thin braided Dyneema core, surrounded in a braided Polyester sheath (for greater UV and abrasion resistance) and the second type is just pure braided Dyneema. The sheathed version is still very strong (2mm Polyester sheathed Dyneema cord has a breaking strain of 125kg (276 lbs)), but it's not as strong as pure braided Dyneema cord...1mm cord made of pure braided Dyneema has a breaking strain of 136kg! (300 lbs!). However, the sheathed version is best for guy lines, which need good abrasion resistance and they can come in virtually any colour combination you can think of. As I like stealth camping I went for plain dark olive green...I find the 2mm sheathed Dyneema cord is perfect for guy lines. To permanently stop the cut ends fraying, simply use a lighter to carefully singe them for a couple of seconds. The Polyester sheath has really nice feel and it's non slip too so your fingers won't slip on it, like they do on Nylon, even when trying to tighten your guy lines in the rain. Tie knots with it and they stay tightened, yet they seem to be easy to undo with your fingers too, although that might be down to the choice of knots I was using.


Edited by Alf (05/17/18 05:13 AM)