What is best for a sling wool, nylon, sisal or hemp?

I made my first sling out of sisal and it wasn't the ideal material.  It's very coarse and knotting it is troublesome.  It also starts to wear at your hands after a while.  Hemp is similar.  

Nylon is good, and certainly high strength.  Lots of the hand braided slings are made from wool, so i assume the material is pretty good.  

Chris

Now lets not forget leather people.  IMHO there's not much that can beat the durability, beauty, and fresh minty smell of animal hide!   ;D ;D ;D

Leon

ok thanks wut do these slings look like that you get for putting in more than 10 dollars?

If your talking about the thank-you sling for contributing to the site's upkeep, they have a leather pouch and military parachute cord.    

Chris

I use Nylon and love it!  Though I have to admit, I haven't used much else.  I'm kinda' slow that way.  When I find something I like, I stick with it.  I've used leather laces, but they didn't work all that well (they kept tangling...see other posts).  But then again, it didn't look half as cool as Leon's.  So, don't count me as dissing leather for slings.  I have used it for pouches though, and it is great! ;D

But as my plug for nylon goes, it's durable and doesn't really rip up your hands at all!

Rob

So far mine have all been made out of the same thing.

I use #18 seine twine for the cords. I do a round 4 plait, like a boyscout lanyard.  I plait in the retention loop and weave the strands along the outside edge of the pouch.  I made one with eight strands and just doubled up on the 4 plait.

The pouch is leather.  I have a small stock of swatches from leather furniture from a furniture store.  They were throwing them away and an aunt saved them.

I have ideas on some other styles and materials but have not yet acted on them.  The ones I make are sort of time consuming, but look good and have an integrated retention loop which works nicely.

The seine twine (mason's line at lowes etc.) comes in various colors and is nylon.  This is durable and relatively cheap.  The leather was free and I have a good supply for now.

I have sent Chris some pics.  Hopefully soon I will get them posted with his help.

Jeff - who slings for fun!

See my post showing pics of my slings and short explanation.

jeff <><

Hey Jeff,

By the 92 viewers of your "Materials" post it looks like there are some more people out there looking to make some slings. Keep your head down and watch for flying stones!

David T

OOOPS!

I thought Jeff started the "Materials" post. Anyway, looks like you are all generating interest.

How 'bout an old shoestring of good length? Sounds kinda tacky I know, but it works great, and costs next to nothing  8)

yah,
i love old shoelaces all my slings are out of shoelaces and nylon straps ;D.Brent

Generally, I am using Cotton, but also, very good materials are Wool and Polyacryl.

I sometimes use hemp, and/or jute, IF I intend to make a braided sling.  Sometimes I use nylon or poly-whatewer cord, if what I got available is of suitable  size I tie  it on to a leather, safety belt or other kind of pouch, if it is to thin I simply braid it.

I do not consider one way or material better than the others, I simply us available or interesting materials in the best way .

I have made usable slings from sisal and tough grass, too, and think they can be made from almost anything available ;)
timann

my primary material is waxed flax, generally in conjuntion with leather or hide pouches, though occasionally i'll make an all flax woven sling. flax is an awesome material to work with. supple, yet strong with no stretch. i'll sometimes make all leather slings as well.
http://i819.photobucket.com/albums/zz119/paleoarts/slings/100_2573480x640.jpg
http://i819.photobucket.com/albums/zz119/paleoarts/slings/100_2126480x640-1.jpg
http://i819.photobucket.com/albums/zz119/paleoarts/slings/100_2251480x640.jpg

My favorite material by far is hemp, but I use a lot of nylon and paracord too. Once I run out of nylon I don't think I'll make any more nylon slings.

Masiakasaurus wrote on Feb 9^th, 2010 at 12:12pm:

My favorite material by far is hemp, but I use a lot of nylon and paracord too. Once I run out of nylon I don't think I'll make any more nylon slings.

Nylon is not so good to make a sling. I think, that the best materials, to make a sling, are NATURAL materials.

Slinger93 wrote on Feb 9^th, 2010 at 12:25pm:

Masiakasaurus wrote on Feb 9th, 2010 at 12:12pm: My favorite material by far is hemp, but I use a lot of nylon and paracord too. Once I run out of nylon I don't think I'll make any more nylon slings. Nylon is not so good to make a sling. I think, that the best materials, to make a sling, are NATURAL materials.

Nylon makes excellent slings! It is weather proof, cheap, easy to get, and doesn't abrade easily. The only reasons I prefer hemp are that I find hemp's rough texture and stiffness easier to braid and I like the look of natural materials. Many people here on the forum use paracord, a nyon rope with a kern and mantle.

I love jute for all my braided slings. My leather pouched slings all have some type of nylon cord.

jute is my favorite, when making it it's stiff, but a good douse in water sorts that out permanently, it's not very scratchy, and even the worst jute only slightly varies in thickness. plus i love the color.

Hi, KB3GZW;
  Nylon is OK,  I like hemp.  I don't like sisal for the reasons the other guys mentioned.  Making a sling with sisal cuts my hands to ribbons.
  Most of my slings are made with cotton, jute, paracord, or sometimes synthetic yarn.  Often I'll include all of those materials in one sling.  Cotton is strong, flexible, and very durable.  It's my favorite material.

Like timann, I use what is at hand. I used to make a number of paracord slings, but lately I have entered into a "greener" phase in slingmaking and used quite a lot of jute (which I find excellent).

By coincidence, I stumbled over some flax twine last weekend, very nice to work with, but 7-8 times more expensive than jute.

Yesterday, I bought:
- 1200 metres of polyacryl
- 510 metres of cotton
- 250 metres of jute
- 740 metres of wool
Total cost of it, was less than £17. So now, I've got a lot of materials and now I am thinking, which slings can I do... (the first one sling, will be staff sling, of course - it will be my second 'staff sling' ever ;) ).

I think, that "jute", is the best material to make "egyptian sling". But "wool", is the best to make "peruvian sling" and "Tibetan" sling.
And also, I think that Cotton is a versatile material - good for the most "types" of slings.

Great honk! That's a lot of string!  :o :o

Fundibularius wrote on Feb 9^th, 2010 at 3:38pm:

By coincidence, I stumbled over some flax twine last weekend, very nice to work with, but 7-8 times more expensive than jute.

i don't know what you consider expensive, but i pay about $6 a roll (900ft +) for my waxed flax. that translates to about 30 all woven slings or about 75 flax/leather combos. to me, that seems pretty cheap.

Where do you buy your flax?

My favorite has always been hemp cords/jute pouch or hemp covered with wool. I use scissors to trim hemp cords and then coat them with beeswax; fire to defuzz the jute pouches, but you need to be quick - it makes great tinder!

http://img4.glowfoto.com/images/2009/05/03-1717042452T.jpg

http://img4.glowfoto.com/images/2009/08/20-2212439672M.jpg

walter

[quote author=paleoarts link=1062172007/15#24 date=1265755719i don't know what you consider expensive, but i pay about $6 a roll (900ft +) for my waxed flax. that translates to about 30 all woven slings or about 75 flax/leather combos. to me, that seems pretty cheap.[/quote]

Expensive compared to jute. The spool of flax (500mts) cost me 16,95 pounds, and it was the first one I saw in months. A roll of jute is 1,99. These are not quite 500 mts, but as the jute is thicker, I can probably get more or less an equal number of slings out of either of them.

Et Cetera wrote on Feb 9^th, 2010 at 9:30pm:

Where do you buy your flax?

Harbor Freight

Paleoarts wrote on Feb 10^th, 2010 at 11:13am:

Et Cetera wrote on Feb 9th, 2010 at 9:30pm: Where do you buy your flax? Harbor Freight

Harbor Freight Tools has flax?! One just opened in my home town. Looks like I have a reason to visit my parents!

If I want to make a natural sling I prefer hemp. Otherwise it's almost all paracord.

7 dollars?!?!?!?!?! darn the best deal I've ever gotten with good quality cord i liked was 1 dollar for 350 feet of ok quality jute with dyed in colors.

I just spoke with my mother, an long-time knitter.  She says she got a lot of wool yarn laying about including a lot of bits and ends and cut-offs and odd colors.  I think there will be sling braiding for me this weekend :)
Then I can compare wool  with other materials.
timann

I prefer natural (or at least natural-looking) materials the most.
My favorite slings thus far are braided from hemp. I also like cotton, but cotton tends to have a bit of memory characteristics, thus why cotton isn't my favorite sling material. (Oddly enough, I find cotton twine far more abrasive than sisal when it comes to braiding.) Sisal is fun to mess with on big slings. You just gotta unkink the sling before use, since sisal is fairly notorious for remembering the twists it was subjected to last. (memory)

Acrylic yarn is the material I've been toying around with lately. It looks and feels like wool, but with added rot resistance. You just gotta make it extra tight and dense when you braid it, so it doesn't feel like trying to sling with a strip of foam.

The only material I'm not very fond of is jute, primarily because of how hairy it is. But who knows, maybe in the future I'll get over that and just run the jute sling over a fire or something to minimize the hairy factor. Hell, I may even love it after that. :P
*Obviously not trying to knock it, in case he starts to really like using jute in the future ;D*

Hairy it may by, but jute is very manageable.  I like it for making a sling like a Rockman, which requires long sections of string.  It seems to resist tangling better than string made of any other material with a similar diameter.  

Hemp or parachute cord is my favorite. I like hemp over jute as it's a bit heavier and a bit more solid feeling.

Now I have made my first wool yarn sling.  OK it looks cool, but wool is definitely not my favotirte materials, it`s to soft and stretchy.  I`ll post a picture elsewhere.
In the hemp versus jute debate, I like both, jute is a little more comfortable, but it tend to shed buring braiding.
timann

Update: while it is a bit annoying to braid, as it sometimes want to tangle and stick together, it can be made into a rather good and useful sling.  

Paleoarts wrote on Feb 9^th, 2010 at 12:04pm:

my primary material is waxed flax, generally in conjuntion with leather or hide pouches, though occasionally i'll make an all flax woven sling. flax is an awesome material to work with. supple, yet strong with no stretch. i'll sometimes make all leather slings as well.

Those slings are BEAUTIFUL! I love the pockets, and the little bead on the down cord especially. I wanna try something like that for my next one. :)