how to hang a pully
We have an old clothesline pole in the yard that id like to hang a pully on. Any ideas besides a very tall extension ladder?
Guest User | 5 years and 7 months ago
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stevecym | 5 years and 7 months ago
@mdr: are you being facetious or are you thinking i might have more to offer? i am not sure where you are coming from because i have been criticized for making numerous replies to a single post.
here is why i offer this stuff up in bits over the course of several posts. having spent a lifetime working with people who do different things and having watched people when i was younger, i don’t readily have things i witnessed or even did myself available in my mind as at 56, some of this stuff was over 30 years ago. knots i had seen people make, i had not seen stuff like that since the 1970’s; there are people reading this right now who were not yet born …. so someone puts a post up and i realize i have something to offer and then i think about it and all this stuff starts coming back – but it takes a couple of days . i also am not always sure what the reader will bring to something I write and in time, i realize they have to be told more (a second pulley to get the actual clothes line down when it needs to be changed; someone might not think of that – at least n ot when they are in the store buying the product). there are things that can be taken for granted with other people, people who have spent a lifetime working with there hands but with folks who don’t often work with their hands (and there is nothing wrong with that; they do what they are good at and i do what i am good at and they pay my bills) there are things that should not be taken for granted; it is hard to figure out what they are. safety is sometimes a concern. someone like me writing something – and i consider myself socially conscious – would not like to hear that someone out there followed my advice and did something wrong or got hurt or even wasted time and money.
in case you or anyone here is wondering how much i might know about something like this: when i was 14, we built a tree fort at the very top of a 60′ high spruce tree in the woods behind my house. we used pulleys and ropes to haul the materials up and not wanting to put nails in the tree, we tied the structural members of the fort (2×4’s) to the tree using rope and it was good rope – not the cheap plastic stuff. that i knock in the posts above. it lasted a good few years. but even though i did all i say i did, it was 1978 and the steps to doing that did not come back to me in 5 minutes (and guess what, we used a knot looped around the 2×4’s to pull them up and they did .slip out but i could not make that knot right now – even if you paid me).
if the op needs more, i will post. but a lot of people probably read things on here that people like me could make child’s play out of and think “this is too much work” or “there is too much experimentation” and don’t bother. if i thought i could make money doing this, for the op or anyone else, i would offer my services. in truth, it would be like learning all over again.
MDR | 5 years and 7 months ago
no more thoughts from Stevecym?
stevecym | 5 years and 7 months ago
i have been thinking more about this: if you find a way to get a hitch knot up on the pole (say by pushing it up with an extension paint pole) you will have to have TWO pulleys on it. one pulley will be afixed to the hitch knot. the other pulley will be on a rope that will be secured at the bottom of the pole. you will want to be able to lower this pulley because that cotton clothes line rope you install will dry out and break in a couple of years and you will have to lower the pulley and install a new clothes line.
all of what i am saying assumes we are talking about a round pole here. i just noticed my neighbor’s clothes line pole, something i had not thought about in years, and it is not a pole at all but some sort of steel structure with multiple legs like a power transmission tower or something. hers could support a ladder though or perhaps it has cross members to climb.
stevecym | 5 years and 7 months ago
and there is something else i realize. most consumers think “home depot” or “lowes” when they need something around the house. most contractors run from those two stores (they are great for screws and nails and i buy my brass wood screws at lowes). those stores are limited and they limit the imagination and worse, if you went in there looking for something, their employees will not tell you you can find better product elsewhere. that is crappy customer service (and ignorance should not be an excuse, it is still crappy customer service).
most of the product i use comes from the maritime industry. i order it commercially. but if i had to buy some rope for something like what you are doing, i would visit West Marine on 34th st or one of the marinas off the belt parkway; that is where i go in a pinch. of course, before you do this, experiment with the cheapo rope from HD and be sure it does what you want.
west marine will also have galvanized pull eys, which will be in line with what resident2 is suggesting.
if you go to west marine for rope, Ian or Dave should be able to suggest the right product to hang on a pole.
stevecym | 5 years and 7 months ago
and i just thought about what resident2 said about the rope and that i mentioned hemp. i don’t think hemp is what you want either. one of my uncles on the east end had a hammock made out of barrel staves and it was held together with rope – real rope from a boat yard. it lasted for ten years or more. i doubt you will find that kind of rope at HD.
also, heavy shock cord. i think if you pull that tight, it will flatten out and hold to the pole real nice. but i am not sure about how long it will last outside.
stevecym | 5 years and 7 months ago
the knot you need is called a “rolling hitch”. you can wrap it at ground level and leave it loose with the pulley on it. you will have to leave a tail on it to pull it tight and you will need to feed your clothes line through it before putting it up.
i just looked at something else called a “double ring hitch” and that may work better.
the way these knots work on a pole is, the more weight that is put on them, the tighter they wrap the pole and hold themselves up, on the vertical. if they ever loosen up, say without any tension or weight on them, they will slip down.
you can experiment at ground level.
People had been doing stuff like this for centuries. no ladders. no books. when i was growing up on Long Island, around commercial fisherman (my uncle was a sail maker and had once worked on oyster boats), i had seen these kinds of men make all sorts of knots, without thinking about it (i don’t know if they knew the names of them though). those guys are gone now and if not for the written record, the rest of us would soon not know how to do anything.
stevecym | 5 years and 7 months ago
and i just read what resident 2 said. a rope will deteriorate in a few years and a plastic rope, that cheap yellow hard stuff (nylon) will not hold around the pole, it will slip. also, if you lean a ladder on that kind of pole, it might bend it over.
i will get the name of the knot in a little while. but it will only work with natural fiber rope, cotton or hemp, preferably hemp which will last longer,. i think they sell some hemp at HD. as for pullys, some reasonable metal ones can be had – i think i had seen some at HD.
resident2 | 5 years and 7 months ago
The only way is for someone to climb up there and secure the initial pulley properly, so spend the money for a good quality Pulley. Not one of the cheap plastic ones usual available at hardware stores these days. With Acid Rain and other pollution plastic pulleys & the natural ropes for the washing line do not last more than 2-3 years. And as you see it will be difficult to find someone to climb up there to replace it.
If you have the access, it is worth getting one of the vehicular extender basket things with a person in it (like you see painting street lights in the streets etc.) Or ask a Tree pruner, or someone that regularly works on scaffolding rigs. Obviously it takes someone accustomed to working in heights. An extension ladder in good weather is the only way for most.
stevecym | 5 years and 7 months ago
there is a way to loop and tie a rope so it tightens as tension is put on it. as it bears down, it will get tighter. you can push it up with a stick so long as it remains loose and once it is at the desired height, you can pulled it tight with a rope looped around the pulley and it will stay. i had seen men do this when i was a child though i never tried it myself. sadly, all but one of those men are gone and the one that remains used other knots but not the one i describe. i have a book of knots here someplace. if i get bored on this rainy day, i might get it out and get you the name of the knot so you can look it up on Google.