Splicing Plaited Line - Since plaited line is tightly braided, even small sizes cannot be spliced without using a fid. You may want to make your own fid from a 12- or 14-inch length of hardwood cut from a swab or broom handle by whittling a long tapering point at one end and sanding it smooth. I had a friend turn one out on a lathe, it was about 6'' long and worked great.
Some other things you will need are a sharp knife, a length of twine, a marking pen or colored marker, and a roll of masking or vinyl tape. Electrical tape that is sticky on both sides should not be used because the tape will be used on the ends of the working strands, and ends wrapped with sticky tape hard to force under the strands of the standing part of the line.
Eye Splice Count from the end of the line nine pics or crowns. A pic is the distance from the topmost point (crown) of one pair of strands to the crown of the next pair of strands of the same color. Tie a piece of twine securely around the line at this point, positioning it over the white crowns. Unlay the line a couple of turns. Cut one strand of each pair shorter than the other, and cut both ends at an angle. Then tape the ends, working from the standing part to the ends. (make sure you don't mix the strands.) Unlay the rest of the line back to the twine.
This type of line has two pairs of right-laid strands and two pairs of left-laid strands. If your line is all one color, use your pen to mark the right-laid strands from the end of the rope through the distance to be worked in making the splice (about five or six pics past the twine). I mark the right layed strands black and leave the left ones white.
1. Form the size of eye desired, and place the black strands on one side and the white strands on the other side of the standing part. Using the fid to open the line, tuck the two pairs of white strands under two successive black strands. Do not drive the fid through a strand, rather than under it. Tuck the pair of strands nearest the eye first. Turn the eye over, and tuck the two pairs of black strands under the nearest white strands. Pull all four strands taut, completing the
first round of tucks.
3. Turn the eye over again, and position the two pairs of white strands so that they are lying next to the white strands of the standing part. Tuck the white strands under the next pair of black strands. Do not pull these strands taut as yet, but you can see that they are now doubling up.
4. Turn the eye over again, and position the two pairs of black strands so that they are lying over the adjacent black strands. Tuck them under the next pairs of white strands. (The first pair go under double-up white strands.) Pull taut all four pairs of strands.
5. Take at least one more tuck with each pair of strands.
6. Take an additional tuck with the pair of white strands of black strands nearest the eye.
7. Now, split the pairs of strands. Take the strand of each pair that is nearest the eye, tape it close to the rope, the portion that is above the tape.
8. Take the remaining strands one by one. Tuck each strand under only a single strand. Then tape and cut off the ends. Next, cutting the ends off flush will make your splice look better.
Be sure and take your time and lay everything out where you can see what your doing, don't loose track of where your at. You can get confused real easy, it seems like a lot of the sailors today can't do this splice, so have fun with it.
