wire splicing opinion

[Des Taff Jenkins]

You are right there Bill, when I packed up the sea in NZ I took up an adult carpentry course, was about 43 years in the industry, new things coming in every year, not excluding Metric.
Des

[Ken Atkinson]

Hi John.
I did plenty of wire splicing such as runners, slings etc
Des

As an engineer on watch, occasionally I would sit and make up a sounding rod with eye-splice and back-splice on the rope. One time the Bosun appeared with a request and asked where I had learnt that so I told him boy-scouts. On other ships I converted burnt Pielstick (medium speed engine) exhaust valves into marlin-spikes by cutting off the valve-seats and machining a taper on the lathe. Sorry to intrude on a decky topic.

[Doug Hardie]

Deep sea Taxi drivers always need Engineers Ha Ha
Doug

[j.sabourn]

Lost the tapered pin on the joining shackle on the anchor cable when unmooring from a buoy in Japan once and had no spares , luckily a couple of engineers knew how to set up the lathe to get the correct taper. More to it than I ever thought. Some of the other engineers were as bright as me. JS.

[Des Taff Jenkins]

Hi Ken.
Wish had sailed with you, I was forever loosing my marlin spike down the holds, wharfies never gave them back.
Des

[j.sabourn]

#25 can never remember anyone using a 6 inch spike for splicing was always at least the 12 inch .The small spike was usually in constant use undoing or tightening up shackle pins. JS

[Des Taff Jenkins]

The working spike was the ones I lost a few of.
Des

[Peter Gill]

At least with a proper wire splice, it was relatively easy to see whether or not it was a good piece of work. I remember having to splice some new lifeboat falls in the early 70's - real sods to work and it did not look at all professional. This nagged at me for some time and I was very relieved when tThe ship went to scrap ten years later and they had survived. A further decade later I was moving a drilling barge offshore Brunei. All the anchor wires and pennants had speltered connections. Over a period of three days no less than four connections failed. There was no visible sign of any deficiency but the Noble Denton Surveyor was rightly unimpressed. By concensus, the rest were all cut out and replaced - much to the annoyance of the drillers - downtime is money!!!. The old ones were tested in a lab of some sort and we were eventually told that there was not a single one which was of an acceptable standard. To this day I am wary of any form of speltered connection - even those I'd done myself.

[Michael Black]

At least with a proper wire splice, it was relatively easy to see whether or not it was a good piece of work. I remember having to splice some new lifeboat falls in the early 70's - real sods to work and it did not look at all professional. This nagged at me for some time and I was very relieved when tThe ship went to scrap ten years later and they had survived. A further decade later I was moving a drilling barge offshore Brunei. All the anchor wires and pennants had speltered connections. Over a period of three days no less than four connections failed. There was no visible sign of any deficiency but the Noble Denton Surveyor was rightly unimpressed. By concensus, the rest were all cut out and replaced - much to the annoyance of the drillers - downtime is money!!!. The old ones were tested in a lab of some sort and we were eventually told that there was not a single one which was of an acceptable standard. To this day I am wary of any form of speltered connection - even those I'd done myself.

When I worked for a testing company I was asked to renew the lifeboat falls on a ship in the Tyne, now I must admit I am not the best of splicers so I was a bit nervous about the job. Went onboard and was happy to see they were terminated in a wedge and socket. Hung them off, removed the old wire, measured them and replaced them with the new wire. Job done in a day.
I used to like doing spelter sockets, making the "broom" with the wire then pouring the wirelock. Went to a job onsite once and realised I had no putty to seal the spelter with, had to drive around looking for a shop, found one that sold plastercine so used that instead.
Regards Michael

[Mike Griffiths]

As an engine room boy ,at my request the engineer I was on watch with showed me how to machine a stepped shaft out of generator exhaust valves , and I honestly cannot remember what I did to make a smooth taper , and I made three spikes two for young deckies and one for myself , which I still use but has been a drift when I was building transmission towers and steel framed farm sheds so it has survined a hard life, I also remember the storekeeper heating them in the boiler and puttin them in sometling that resembled grease to case harden them . Maybe you would know what the process was , as it would have been 1966 or so and my grey cells have blurred my reccolections.