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The original was posted on /r/Ultralight by /u/GoSox2525 on 2024-03-10 07:14:29.

Finally got my tarp! Borah 7x9 Silpoly. I’m really excited to give it a shakedown. I spent a few hours today trying out different pitches. It was frustrating and very tiring work! But also satisfying when you finally get the shape right.

I figured I would save weight, favor simplicity, and gain some skills by working with only knots. I’m a climber and am generally familiar with an inventory of hitches and knots, so I really thought this would be perfectly enjoyable. Bowline to fix the lines to the tarp loops. I tried Truckers hitches, McCarthy hitches, and taut-line hitches to tension the lines on the stakes. I’m using 1.5 mm dyneema cord. Some observations:

• taut-line hitches are really annoying to untie from a cord this thin, and I’ll probably never use them again. I’m lucky that I have long fingernails right now, because I usually don’t. A big load-releasable knot e.g. slip is so much better and easier to use.
• both the McCarthy and truckers hitch are easy enough and hold well. However, I already tore through the sheath on one of the ridge line guylines using a trucker’s hitch, and I’m seeing fraying at the tarp-end Bowlines as well! This actually seems unavoidable; 1.5 mm line is so thin that it acts like a saw when pulling tension into the line. How do people avoid this?? I can think of a few ways to mitigate the friction, but they all involve not really taking advantage of the 3-1 that you’ve created.
• 8 ft of cord at the tarp corners seems like too much
• 10 ft of cord for the ridgeline is good, if anything not quite enough
• clove hitching to the poles works well
• I decided to switch from Bowlines to mini Litesmith carabiners for just the ridgeline cords. This was actually very nice, since different pitches require the position of the poles to be moved around. I didn’t do this on the corners since they won’t move

Anyway, my conclusions are that I actually hated doing this with knots. It was really not enjoyable, not efficient, and not even sensible when line-locs exist. It uses more cord length, puts the cord at risk of damaging friction, and takes longer than it needs to, especially when you’re constantly adjusting corners.

I’ll like switch to 2-2.5mm line, shorter cord sections, and line-locs. Specifically, the best choice seems to be line-loc Vs (or similar) at the tarp loops. That way gives you adjustability over essentially the entire length of the cord. This would primarily work at the corners. For the poles, the tensioning generally happens at the stake and not at the tarp, so there, micro line-locs might be needed. Or just tie semi-permanent taut like hitches that I won’t untie.

Am I totally dumb? Was I doing something wrong? Has anyone else come to similar conclusions?