In old school logging
Chain was used commonly for several reasons: it could be repaired in the field if need be, it was easy to use repair links to make two small chains into one large chain, and if the load let loose, the chain snaps but the individual links bang against one another absorbing a good deal of the stored energy. It can still whip, but will do so less than a wire rope, which if it snaps, is a serious weapon. A poly rope is as well, but it is less likely to murder and more likely to maim.
I’ve been dragging some really impressively sized wood up the hill in the backyard with a combination of chain (to cinch the load) and rope (to attach to the tractor). I await the day the rope snaps and smacks me in the back of the head. it cannot be far off. So I need to beg, buy, borrow some more chains.
meanwhile Father’s day was full of fire, fireworks, food, family, fun, and orphaned rodentia. I did a good deal of the cooking and subsequently didn’t eat very much, but what I did eat included some awesome black forest bacon.
And I dreamed of going to the Stan as a contractor. US servicemen were being rotated out and they were all smuggling home spider eggs in their kit. The effort required to find all this shit and decontaminate it was intense, and they got me to go in and find out the whys and wherefores.
Turns out, the service guys were so homesick for good old American fast food they had hit on these big ass spiders- the bodies about 6″ long and the legspan a couple feet- that had abdomens that were pale tan with spots that looked very much like sesame seeds. they called them Asperger’s spiders. This is the kind of shit I get for reading Allie Brosh
So they were grilling them and eating them. And they had developed such a hankering for them a couple of them wanted to farm and eat them back home.
I shuddered with the creepiness of it all. And no, I didn’t eat one. I woke up waving around saying “keep that creepy shit away from me”. Fortunately the Ogwife can sleep through nuclear holocaust, so I got up, hit my morning constitutional, and tried to forget. I didn’t, of course, and now I’m sharing with you.
Another advantage to chain for pulling is that it’s easy to attach “dampers” to it. I used homemade canvas sandbags, about 6-8 inches square, with a pound or two of sand in them. Grommets at diagonally opposite corners, bolted to the chain using wing nuts for speedy attach/remove.
I suspect the same trick might work with cable, but I’d want longer “dampers” and thread the cable through the grommets. Not as convenient.
I got about 80 feet of 3/8 or larger chain. Say the word and you get ’em.
I may well take you up on that.
Chain is good stuff if you are pulling a load. My brothers truck got hit with a flying bumper once using a snatch strap. He spent a few days in the white room under observation and the truck got a new cab.
Storing energy in a rubber band is a singularly bad idea. I don’t use wire for anything other than a static load. Dynamic always gets chain.
And I thought ‘my’ dreams were strange…
Thanks for that.
I had the dream of brakes failing again. I only have that dream when I am dream-driving Chevys and Fords. Dream analysis says I am subconsciously feeling like my life is spinning our of control. But I don’t see how. Not much changes for a Career civil servant with ten years doing the same job at the same office.