Often fishing weights are prone to tumble in my experience. 
The perfect shape ones do exist but not all are the same.

I've tried making cordage from it. But that was before I knew how to scrape the fibers clean. Try scraping a leaf and see what kind of fibers you can get. You can also try retting some leaves in water for a week or two and then scraping.  I googled "cattail fiber" and found a paper that was extracting fiber to look for a cotton replacement.. they had minor success it seemed.

If you are adding cords into a braid, then braiding slippery stuff can be an issue, but if you braid in the new cords for a long enough length, there should be enough friction to hold it in place. Not to mention the braid also tightens on itself with tension.

But that is theoretical at this point in time. I have never used fishing line.

Quick braiding question, when twisting am I supposed to twist both in the same direction or towards each other? Typically I'll twist from left to right (or clockwise) for both sides, am I supposed to go clockwise on the left and then counterclockwise on the right?

I got this book https://www.amazon.com/Sling-Braiding-Traditions-Techniques-Bolivia/dp/076435430...
And did one of the cordless braids and it turned out square but in the book the braids seemed round
So my question is are some Peruvian/Andean braids square ? And does it affect the functionality of the sling

Ok cool thanks I just figured I was screwing it up

jw wrote on Mar 6^th, 2022 at 11:31am:


Well, in principle yes, but you really, really don't want to do it. 

I assume you ran out of string? If you ran out of strings, the easiest way is to add a piece with a weavers knot, then try to hide the knot inside the braid. But it will be visible.

Another option is to extend the strings directly. This works reasonably well with wool, where you can just "re-spin" a small part.  But you have to be careful when braiding afterwards.

A bit more work, but also possible, is to put a new string into the core, braid a bit, then replace one of the braiding strings with the string from the core, and put the replaced string into the core. Then repeat this 23 times  .

A fourth option is to do just double up the braid and "hide" the standing ends  in plain sight as a colorful decoration/tassel/small braids. Then braid a couple cm doubled up, then either pull the short ends out and leave them standing (again a tassel or small braids) or put them into the core and taper them out.

As a side note: Eye splices are also possible, but quite a different thing to do.

For the sling I'd probably go aussie pouch paracord and keep it relatively short 18-26''. Tennis balls are quite light so can be difficult to throw well with heavier slings- you can do it but it requires clean technique.

There's people here that sling tennis balls more than me though and may know better.