Learn How to Tie Knots | Hacker News Reader

Learn How to Tie Knots

animatedknots.com

I've had this damn site bookmarked for longer than I can remember. At least 4 years, I think, and maybe as long as 9. Idk. I always tell myself "someday I'm going to sit down and learn knots from this site," but someday never seems to come.

Maybe because in reality I have almost no use whatsoever for knot-tying, as cool as it is.

This is the key, as with many things it’s hard to get momentum established without some external motivation. It was always interesting to me but I could never keep a knot in my head until I picked up fly fishing.

I end up at this site about once a year trying to refresh my memory on a good knot for securing a load, but their categorization system makes that particularly hard to find. Once you do, their presentation is pretty good, but I find the site navigation very frustrating.

Betting that's the Trucker's Hitch[1] which is a knot (or more like a combination of knots, really) which everyone should know! I tend to use an Alpine Butterfly[2] for the loop, but that's partly because it's a personal fave.

1: https://www.animatedknots.com/truckers-hitch-knot 2: https://www.animatedknots.com/alpine-butterfly-loop-knot

Seconded. The trucker's hitch is super useful, but most people have no idea that such a thing exists. Knots are good technology. Everyone should know a few, and this one is in the top four. But I agree with others here who've noticed that you need to practice frequently to keep from forgetting them.

Along the lines of the trucker's hutch, I particularly like the Versatackle knot system:

https://notableknotindex.webs.com/Versatackle.html

I've used it for a long time as well. I love learning new knots and it provides very through instructions on how to tie them. My problem is that, if I don't continually practice, I quickly forget. Fortunately, I have 4 or 5 goto knots that serve nearly every conceivable situation where a knot is required.

Can you name them ?

Not the parent comment, but you'll get a long way with a figure-8 (both on a working end and on a bight), a clove hitch, and an alpine butterfly. I'm sure others have a couple more favorites.

(this is omitting a few "foundation" knots like the overhand)

My dirty dozen-ish: tautline hitch, bowline, square knot, figure eight + variants, fisherman's knot, N half hitches, sheet bend, Zeppelin bend, trucker hitch, Alpine butterfly, hangman knot, and a variant on the shoe knot that doesn't come loose. Can't remember the name but in sure you can find many variants with a search.

Square knot most people already know. Tautline and bowline are the two worth memorizing being able to do soaking wet in the dark.

Personally I rate the figure-8 over the bowline. I think it's a much more versatile family (and much easier to tie and inspect with high confidence soaking wet in the dark).

Good point! I think I mentally chucked it with the square knot under "knots that should already be in most people's inventory" but you are right, that is definitely worth learning, since there are so many useful variants.

So like, 4 essential knots: Figure 8, square knot, bowline, hitch. The map, filter, fold, and reduce of knots, if you will. Most everything else can be composed from those.

Learn a munter hitch, it's extremely versatile and can do everything from securing something, to belaying or rappeling off it (with a locking carabiner). It is an extremely important knot for setting up rescue systems as it can hold a load under tension, yet can be undone and slack added to the system while under complete control.

I've taught a few dozen ropes course leaders over the years. Knots fall out of people's minds surprisingly quickly. It isn't like riding a bike.

If I were to venture a hypothesis, it is because riding a bike really requires "rewiring" inside the brain, as an all-body activity and involving a large amount of muscles and coordinating them. Which also is why it takes a while, unless you already trained to get the required balance control through some other means (the Asian martial arts fantasy movies come to mind, people running over easily rolling tree trunks floating in water - if you can do that you probably need less time to pick up riding a bicycle).

Knots on the other hand probably mostly only use the existing wiring scheme, so unless you have really bad hand/finger coordination you don't need to change how the muscles (of only arm - slightly, hand, fingers) are activated and used.

Purely intellectual knowledge is easily forgotten unless used, but activities that required certain neurons for proprioception and muscle control to find new connections remain much more easily - also takes a lot longer to gain.

Knots are easy to forget unless you actually understand the knot.

For example, I can tie a bowline as well as most bowline-like knots (ex: sheet bend) without a recipe and even come up with variants on the fly, and I don't think I will ever forget that. This is, of course, after tying a lot of bowlines and forgetting recipes dozens of times.

I think that's for your "riding a bike" analogy. Really understanding a knot takes time and effort, but allows you to remember and even improvise. Memorizing a recipe is faster, more efficient, but easier to forget.

I have almost zero use for knots, but use it as a kind of a meditative practice and as something to do when I'm watching tv or a movie. I think it's analogous to crocheting or knitting in that regard.

Well, crocheting and kitting are both tying knots in yarn.

same here. Was excited to see "Knot of the Day", thought I could add that to my RSS reader and look at one each day..could not find a way to do that.

Favorite and forget. I'm a climber and use a handful.

Do you use any other knots than the 8 knot for climbing?

You will almost certainly want to know the butterfly knot and a number of hitches and bends: https://www.animatedknots.com/climbing-knots

Can't comment for parent, but I agree. As a climber I only know a couple of knots, and don't usually need anything outside this set, in order of utility:

- figure 8 - clove hitch - klemheist - overhand bend - girth hitch - munter hitch - prussik - ring bend - double fishermans - bowline

That prussik might save your life, that's for sure:)

This is a good selection of climbing knots.

I went down a rabbit hole recently surveying the "current internet wisdom" regarding the use of the double bowline with fisherman as a tie in knot for the climber ...

To recap briefly -- figure 8 follow through is the standard tie in knot that everyone is taught. It's easy to tie, easy to verify visually, and secure -- but it's hard to untie after being weighted by a fall.

That last fact matters a lot when sport climbing when taking big falls a lot is expected. Hence the several different versions of the bowline ... which is also secure if tied properly, easier to tie wrong, harder to verify visually, but extremely easy to untie after weighting ... Unfortunately there's a bit of a controversy in the climbing world regarding "what people are likely to do wrong" and whether those kinds of risks should guide people towards not using the double bowline as a tie in ... there are also multiple variations of the bowline -- some of which actually are less secure ...

Personally I've been using the double bowline with a fisherman finishing knot for years now when sport climbing -- but it's a bitch to say it ... -- but I think a worthy addition to your list (or at least a clarification that the regular bowline by itself is not really used for anything in climbing)

Apparently there is a wrong way of tying a figure 8, that leads to a version that is much harder to untie. Personally I've never had issues untying a figure 8, so it might just be that my default way of tying it happened to be the correct way.

It's described in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAr-uHd8h8o Skip to 13:20 for the interesting part.

That's a very interesting and well-done experiment! I definitely learned something -- and I buy the argument that there is a way to tie a figure 8 that makes it less likely or significantly less likely to be difficult to untie ...

But I think that as rope wears and as humidity goes up -- you'll still easily find situations where the knot was correctly tied but still a lot of effort to untie after load ...

And 12-18 seconds to untie is still a lot more time required than untie'ing the double bowline ... And he's showing figure 8 on a bite so he doesn't have to take the extra seconds to undo the figure 8 after ... that's not a huge deal but the double bowline is still imo easier to tie, faster to tie, and faster/more ergonomic to untie -- and also of course, harder to verify that it was tied safely by visual inspection ...

Just curious, why is the clove hitch so high on the list.

I hate that knot, and never understood its widespread popularity. It tends to jam and slip. I guess that there are cases where these combined properties are useful, for example if you want to make things adjustable, but most of the times, I just find it unsafe and hard to control.

I did a bit of sailing and while the clove hitch was taught early, we almost never used it. I'd say the most useful list include, from memory: bowline - figure 8 - two half hitches - cleat hitch - reef knot, and of course, proper coiling.

About the reef knot. It is also called the square knot, and it should be used only when appropriate (ex: on reefing), it can be dangerous when misused.

I also tried a more... adult kind of knot tying and the clove hitch is generally a bad idea.

In multipitch climbing the clove hitch is used to attach yourself to every belay. In this situation adjustment is useful. It usually only holds body weight, and it's always tied in a carabiner, so you can slide the carabiner out instead of untying. It doesn't slip with climbing ropes either. So it's perfect for climbing.

This.

It's what I use between my harness and the anchor to tie myself to the belay

I have used it with, say, guy lines on a tent, and it is finicky there, or around a tree... but with a 9mm climbing rope and a carabiner it's quite good.

It's easy to inspect, it is easy to tell if you've tied a girth or munter hitch on accident, and it's easy to untie by removing the carabiner.

Best of all, it's very easy to adjust without fully undoing the knot, and so you can change the length of the tether quickly.

I was taught to use the clove hitch as a fast and easy to check way to secure something, typically for a backup to a primary anchor or knot. Like once you get up to the top and are anchoring in you can throw a quick clove hitch on as a backup while you get a stronger anchor setup. We also used it in crevasse rescue situations as a backup for the prusik/friction hitch.

I love this website. Having spent a bit of time on yachts I already had a reasonable grounding, but it’s easy to forget knots you’re not using. For a while I found the easiest way to get to sleep each night was to try to picture how to tie the tumble hitch and visualising where the forces were held.

https://www.animatedknots.com/tumble-hitch-knot

Maybe because in reality I have almost no use whatsoever for knot-tying, as cool as it is.

A long time ago I learned "as de guía", let me see the translation... bowline. It's the only knot I've ever needed. I know there are a lot of specialized knots for different situations. But this one in particular is like a swiss army knife. Clothes lines, anything to lift, packaging...

If I needed something more specific I'd be happy to learn more.

That's a really useful knot, especially if you also know how to tie two half hitches [1] for securing the other end in a way that can be tightened. The sheet-bend [2] and square knot [3] are my other two favorite useful knots.

[1] https://www.animatedknots.com/two-half-hitches-knot

[2] https://www.animatedknots.com/sheet-bend-knot

[3] https://www.animatedknots.com/square-knot

I like a Lark's Head (https://www.animatedknots.com/cow-hitch-knot-end-method) with a Half-Hitch. Very easy for most people to remember, applicable everywhere.

Thank you! They seem very easy to learn.

These are exactly the knots they teach in Boy Scouts. All very simple and worthwhile to learn.

Every knot I know now, I originally learned in Boy Scouts. Because I actually sat down and practiced them for a week+.

Best advice for learning: get a convenient (2-4' depending on knots) piece of rope, thin enough to be portable, thick enough to be manageable, and practice tying knots as a fidget spinner

Initially it will be tough and require thought, but for a lot of the patterns you can do it without looking after a bit of practice. And repetition breeds memory.

Truckers Hitch is also very useful. Allows you to get things very tight due to functioning like a pulley.

https://www.animatedknots.com/truckers-hitch-knot

This and the bowline are my favorite knots

The Bowline and Reef knots are the only two I've ever needed.

The Bowline is definitely the only knot to learn if you have to choose just one.

There are 3 (that I know of) different ways to tie it that are worth learning as a next step. One of them lets you prepare it so you can quickly tie it around something and have it invert on itself to form. Another technique actually revels that the bowline is the same as a sheet bend, just using one line folded back on itself to make a loop instead of 2 lines joined. So that’s a freebie (and the sheet bend is a great knot).

It’s super versatile.

I never use the reef knot anymore. Lost a dingy in Greece because I trusted it for about 5 minutes. I find it works itself free really easily.

> I never use the reef knot anymore. Lost a dingy in Greece because I trusted it for about 5 minutes. I find it works itself free really easily.

Hmmm... I'll keep that in mind. Thanks.

The bowline is very useful, and there are several ways to tie it, depending on the thickness of the line.

I find I use the midshipman’s knot at least as frequently. It seems I’m always tying knots in lines that need to be adjusted: Boat covers, awnings, tent ropes, etc.

https://www.animatedknots.com/midshipmans-hitch-knot

Do you have a kinky significant other / do you want one? Pick up some 4mm braided nylon rope from Home Depot, google "rope bondage", and go to town. (Books from Two Knotty Boys, Lee Harrington, and Jay Wiseman are the gold standard instructions; Douglas Kent's books have lots of technical information, but are apparently rife with errors)

Two knots: bowline and trucker’s hitch. You’ll need them one day.

Trucker's hitch isn't really a specific knot. It's a technique that can use any number of knots (you just need to be able to put a loop in the middle of the rope and tie some sort of securing knot in the running end).

Also Zeppelin and constrictor for joining ropes and tying bags.

I use the alpine butterfly to make a trucker's hitch, and I'll often use a friction knot at the end when I've tensioned the line. With those few knots I can use a single 100ft rope in place of a bunch of ratcheting hitches for securing loads in the bed of my truck. And when I want to release the load I can just untie a couple of corners and the whole rope comes out.

I started learning knots by having a sailboat where they are undeniably useful. However, after learning a handful, they end up being useful in all areas of life wherever one needs to hold something to something else (in a car, on a bike, in the yard when it's windy, endless possibilities).

To echo others, if you have interest to learn just one thing, learn the bowline. You can get through life knowing just that.

Backpacking finally got me motivated to tie knots. On a single trip I had two janky plastic connectors break leading to some very awkward tying and repositioning of gear. This got me thinking about what people did in the wilderness before everything had its own little custom plastic latch, and the so obvious mind-blowing conclusion that they knew their knots and just used rope.

Knots are kind of like manual transmission. It's a skill that everybody used to have until it was replaced by a more convenient technology that nobody had to learn.

So for me, the realization that with a little knowledge I could obsolete an entire classification of annoying and breakable connectors got me to finally sit down and study knots.

If curious, past threads:

Animated Knots: Learn how to tie knots with step-by-step animation - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20074496 - June 2019 (65 comments)

Also:

Andy's Most Useful Knots - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1558169 - July 2010 (22 comments)

The Most Useful Rope Knots for the Average Person - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=828539 - Sept 2009 (49 comments)

I've left out Ian's Shoelace Site since that's its own specialty.

This is a cool guide, but knots are max 50% of the ball game when doing anything useful with rope. If you want to learn knots, a better place to start is picking a task like “set up a ridge line for a tarp” or “hang a bear bag” or “set a top rope belay”. Knots are a part of that, but their strengths and weaknesses don’t make much sense outside of an actual application (unless you like just tying them, in which case go ham).

It’s kind of like knowing the syntax for a class. Like it’s cool and all, but the syntax part isn’t the interesting part of classes, it’s how they can be used/abused.

totally agree on that. the site is great, but use cases are more important

Ian's Shoelace Site https://www.fieggen.com/shoelace/ is a classic. Discussed a few times here, including https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16454796.

I started using that since seeing it here and it's great. Also just tried this Surgeon's shoelace bow [0] and it seems good for walking boots, will be testing it out!

[0]: https://www.animatedknots.com/shoelace-bow-knot-surgeons

For me, it's the lack of consistent practice in order to retain the knowledge. I rarely tie knots frequently enough to remember how to tie a few, let alone dozens of different kinds of knots. Maybe I need to do more mountain climbing, camping, boating!

Same here. I retained enough knowledge from my Boy Scout days to know that there are different knots that are useful for different purposes, but aside from tying my shoelaces, a Windsor knot, and an occasional square knot I always have to go back to references.

That's interesting, I feel like I tied the same dozen or so knots for 7 years that I can still tie knots for which I can't remember the names.

I spent a few months on Zoom tying knots under the camera. I have busy hands. Now I know quite a few knots by heart.

There is also Knots3D with a good Android app. https://knots3d.com/

As a climber what I see is that in general you learn your knots and practice them until you can tie them blindfolded, sometimes single handed, sometimes with gloves on!.

As a beginner you need probably two or three knots (fig. 8 for tie in, prussik for a rappel backup, double fisherman) As you progress you learn other knots for other purpose and some alternatives. (alpine butterfly, bowline, other friction hicthes, munter mule and so on) Then you stick with the ones you like most or are most versatile and you probably won't need no learn any new knot unless you start doing any new stuff (like start ice climbing if you never done that).

So, those resource are good for visual learners but once you learn it and use it regularly you'll probably never forget.

We do regular trips up to the BWCA (Boundary Waters Canoe Area) - an area between northern Minnesota and Canada. Fantastic camping where you paddle in and basically only get a fire pit and shitter - the rest is wilderness.

As is tradition, we always will get a bit of rain (or sun). We pack in a small collection of tarps and generally engage in building out some of the most half assed structures ever seen. Those who have done this a few times have a small collection of effective knots. Others end up with something touched by His Noodly Appendage. Always good fun to see a 20-30x20-30ish structure try to survive the winds/rain - more often badly.

This being HN, does anyone have any knot suggestions for computer cables? For example, I have several cables that are too long and I tie them up with a twist-tie, but maybe there's a knot for that.

Some features that a good computer cable knot would have:

- No sharp bends (could damage cable internals)

- Stable but able to untie easily by pulling (like shoelaces)

- Can tie with one end still plugged in

You're looking for "Cable Lacing", a somewhat lost art in general that is still useful in large data center deployments as well as whatever you are trying to do, of course.

Maybe a Sheepshank https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheepshank ?

I just go with the roadie wrap and let out enough so the cable is just long enough to reach from A to B.

First google hit for me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kda4DPAn3C4

He mentions "flaking the line" which is also an important thing to do with climbing ropes, which are understandably mentioned all over this thread. Climbing ropes aren't that dissimilar from cables; there's a core and a sheath, and you don't want that core becoming twisted inside. That's why you don't want to ever tie cables into knots.

Before going backpacking last year, I decided to learn a bunch of knots while I was watching TV and relaxing. It was really helpful during the trip; I'm usually a "use a variation of an overhand or square knot for everything" type of person, but knowing a few specialized knots was really helpful when setting up camp (securing tarps, hanging hammocks, attaching gear to the bag).

This is my favorite knot, its called the midshipman's hitch on animated knots but I knew it as taut-line hitch from my book: https://www.animatedknots.com/midshipmans-hitch-knot

I keep a couple lengths of rope (550) next to my desk. When I’m pondering a challenging problem and I can’t take a walk, I practice knots. I find it to be a very good way to get my head completely off the problem and yet easy to stop so I can start working again.

This is a excellent knot with many, many great uses. I personally prefer the taut-line hitch because it’s faster and easier to tie, even if not quite as strong.

Combine this with an alpine butterfly[1] to add loops and you can basically create a leveraged way to tighten a rope.

1. https://www.animatedknots.com/alpine-butterfly-loop-knot

I never realized this before, but I think I've actually invented a new way to tie a necktie. I've been doing it the same way for years, but it is different from any of the knots presented on this site. My technique produces a symmetric knot which falls apart when the short end is removed. It is distinguished from all the other knots by having the long end go behind the short end as the first step. It's a little hard to describe how it goes from there without images, but you basically do the first half of a Windsor backwards, wrap the long end around the front, and then finish like a regular Windsor.

Maybe I should apply for a patent :-)

I was given the book "The 85 ways to Tie a Tie" as a gift many years ago. It is a wonderful read for nerds.

"Two physicists prove that there are not just four ways to tie a tie, but a further eighty-one. ‘The 85 Ways to Tie a Tie’ unravels the history of ties, the story of the discovery of the new knots and some very elegant mathematics in action."

https://www.amazon.in/85-Ways-Tie-Science-Aesthetics/dp/1841...

Only on HN :-) Thanks!

I’ve done the same for 25 years!

My fav is the carnation knot for weddings.

Strangely these sites never have the most useful knots. Most prominently the "recursive slipknot", where you secure a slipknot with a slipknot until it feels secure. And the other one is "reverse-8". First you make a single eight and the you track the eight with another rope but from opposite end. Mountaineers seem to extend their ropes with this, because the knot is still easy to open. Third one is the "reindeer-knot" suitable for frozen leather, but I cannot describe it easily.

Shame, it looks like the Sheet Bend is advertised on the front page as one of the "Basic Knots" to start with but I think the Zeppelin Bend[0] is far superior and just as easy to grok. It is more secure than a Sheet Bend and yet paradoxically easier to untie after heavy load.

https://www.animatedknots.com/zeppelin-bend-knot

Spent a lot of time on this site this summer.

Both good instructions & good materials to understand each knot, some background on it & it's uses. The "knots by type" (categories) are a good split of general function. Still, it was a bit difficult to find what the really good knots for any given application were, to know what to pick.

Yes, I have run across this before. And I'm not talking about the Ashley Book of Knots, either. I think there's room for a sensible book that is like a flowchart.

1) What are you tying to what else? 2) Do you have a free end or not? 3) Is this a synthetic rope? Is there a size difference? And other factors that might determine which knot you want to use.

I got a couple of books on knots and this sort of thing wasn't coherently addressed, which I thought was a shame.

That is so overwhelming.

I’d prefer to learn say the top four knots to get me through 90% of my life. At least to get started.

For me, I only know two advanced knots. Anchor Bend which is a variation of clove hitch [1]. And zeppelin for connecting two lines. [2].

[1] http://www.surreyknots.org.uk/15-clove-hitch-variations.htm [2] http://www.surreyknots.org.uk/55-rosenthal-zeppelin-knot.htm

Awesome site! I was trying to teach my son how to do various knots but he has no interest - even the more risqué knots like the hangman knot or the handcuff knot can't compete with Minecraft. I always thought it was an awesome life skill to have.

Disappointed it didn't include a category for the type of knots I was looking for.

They've got categories for Boating, Fishing, Climbing, Surgical, Arborist, Scouting, Horse & Farm, Decorative, and several other groups of knots.

I would suggest starting out learning the basic bowline as the most generally useful knot, and go from there: https://www.animatedknots.com/bowline-knot

What category of knots are you looking for? ...oh wait, nevermind, I just got it. Be aware that the bowline can slip loose when the load is repetitively applied and released.

Sewing knots are far more useful than any of those other categories and are conspicuously missing.

I wonder why. Is it because the list only picks the meme "manly" types of knots?

> Disappointed it didn't include a category for the type of knots I was looking for.

Disappointed you didn't share what it was you were looking for.

I'm just being cheeky.

Elvish knots as seen in The Lord of the Rings, which are secure but auto-open when the user needs them to...

A wonderful site! Still, I wasn't able to find a knot specifically for securing a hammock between two trees. Any recommendations?

If only it was practical to shove rope into one's pockets. The resulting knots are always fun to untie

Is there a guide to tying shoelaces? Figure it’s easiest to teach my child with an animation.

I think Ian's Shoelace Site[1] is famous[2] and you're one of today's lucky 10,000[3]:

1. https://www.fieggen.com/shoelace/

2. https://hn.algolia.com/?q=ian%27s+shoelace&type=comment

3. https://xkcd.com/1053/

My kids are rockstar's at school with these. At least they were when they stopped going a year ago. Sigh.

Yes: https://www.ted.com/talks/terry_moore_how_to_tie_your_shoes

some previous discussion:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20074496

Reply on news.ycombinator.com