Whip Rope
 

We have been using whips now on our dock for about 5 years, but in the last few years we've noticed that we only get a season or so out of our whip ropes. Part of this is due to being in a busy area, but it seems like they should last longer than this. We are using them properly and don't have any snag points in the rope movement. I think it is just the amount of cycling that the rope is going through that is creating the chafing. Looking for recommendations on what others are using for abrasion resistant rope for whips. Thanks.

An interesting puzzle. I have 5 seasons on mine, and they look basically new, although I'm only holding a day sailer. Where is the rope worn?

Go see Bart at Parafunalia in Gilford. He will set you up with the right rope. My whip rope from there is 6 years old and still looks new. It takes a lot of abuse on the west side of Welch too...

Dan

Whip ropes
 

If you have enough line, try changing the length of the line so that it rolls over the tip in a different spot. This might help. Also, Dan said, using the correct type of line is important.

Worn
 

The rope is worn, where it rides over the top of the whip. I checked that area for burrs or wear points, and there doesnt appear to be any. Is the stainless dowel at the top of the whip supposed to rotate or be fixed? Mine is fixed, but I think mechanically there would be less friction if it was a roller style mechanism.

Agreed on the friction--I think the fixed axis is your problem, not the rope itself. Mine is 1 or 2" plastic wheel that spins around an axis. Looking forward to hearing if others with long-lived rope have fixed dowels or spinning wheels.

Changing my whip rope is on my to-do list. Mine wears at the pivot point too and you can hear it creak all the time from the friction. I've checked out Overtons and West Marine for new tips and they're not available. I found some double braid rope made in the USA by Blue Ox on amazon that will work and didn't cost a lot. Rope can be very expensive and where my whips aren't used all the time I was ok with paying a little less.

I have a wheel as well, and the rope is about 7 years old maybe older. (actually like a clothes line rope type.

The ones with the steel bar don't always have the bar that spins, but I would try soaking it with PB baster or something like that to see if it should be spinning if not, I would take some old garden hose and slide it on the rope and set it at the top so it bends with the rope around the bar instead of the rope right on the bar

My whips are from 2001. No roller. Just a hole through the end of the whip the rope goes thru with a knot on the back side. I'm still on the original rope. Boat weighs 3,800lbs

And does it have a tensioner at the end to tighten it up? I've been looking for a tip and tensioner with no luck.

Yes it does have a tensioner. My buddy has the same whips and his are still going fine as well. Couple years after we bought ours theY changed to the roller tip and that’s wen problems started.

Reversed lines.
 

The last year that I had my boat (2019), I reversed the whip lines so that the end that secured the line to the whip mount was now the tensioner end. I noticed that the line wasn't worn per se, it just looked a little different in the area where it passed over the roller.

Dave

I have to admit to seeing the same thing. My whips are roughly the same age, and the original rope shows no issues. Honestly, I am surprised I would have expected to have replaced the rope at this point, but still see no reason too....

As others have posted the whips with the rollers at the end seem to be more problematic, especially with heavier boats. I have a set of those too, but only ever really used them for a jet-ski, and never noticed much wear.... but that was a jet ski, vs. a much heavier boat.

Now the other thing that can cause premature wear, is not having the boat tied properly and allowing to much movement forward and backward.... those wheels work great in one direction, yawing action is not good, and in a busy area could be part of the problem.

Where I was docking my boat, the wave problem wasn't wind caused wave action, but rather from boat wakes. Most came from a direction essentially from the port aft to the starboard bow, an angle.

Besides dock lines and whip lines fore and aft, I also used a spring line that ran from an aft dock cleat to the boat mid-cleat then on to a bow dock cleat. It did a great job of keeping the boat aligned with the whips , virtually eliminating back and forth motion.

Dave

I found a couple of inch and a half 420 lb pulleys at Heath's and mounted them to the tips of my whips. The pivot point was just a small hex bolt with a nylon lock nut that I used to attach the pulley eye. I strung the new whip line through the pulley and now I don't expect to hear any squeaking or see any wear. I should have done that years ago.

Whip ropes
 

No matter what you do, there definitely ought to be a roller at the tip of the whip, otherwise there will be constant friction and the rope will very quickly by unfit for use. If you can not put a roller at the end of the whip, try the swivel pulley solution. Attach the swivel pulley to the top of the whip and lead the line through the pulley back to the fastening point at the base of the whip. Using a swivel pulley gives you the added advantage of reducing any "side to side" chaffing (because it will swivel), while having constant frictionless motion at the tip.

Sailing Block
 

We had the same issue our first year with whips on the Broads. We placed high-quality pulleys, sailing blocks, to reduce the wear on the rope and the angle in which the rope bends. Worked like a charm. PS - spend the money on stainless steel.

Developed for Sailing...Replaces Stainless Steel Cable...
 

Rope in the Amsteel or Dyneema range could break your whips, while polypropylene won't last a season.

The rope I used was 5/16 double braid polyester for $37 for 100ft from amazon. It frayed pretty bad when cut and needed some trimming and a flame to melt the ends.

Make a few tight wraps of electrical tape in the same direction as the lay of the line around the spot where you'll make the cut. Use a fresh razor blade and cut in the middle of the electrical tape and then use a butane torch to seal the ends of the line back up. You can leave the electrical tape or peel it off after, but this method should yield factory like results if you don't have access to a proper hot knife.

Update
 

Thank you for all the great suggestions and all the ideas that people are currently using. I think we will try to keep the forward-backward motion of the boat to a minimum with some sort of spring line, as well as making sure that the tip of the whip has a roller/swivel type combination. Our whips have a fixed stainless bar that the rope rides over and this no doubt is causing the friction problem. Time to modify it.