Let me say the same thing, in other words :
2. The bowline can not work, if only the first leg of the collar is nipped once, and there is no friction on the line AFTER the first leg of the collar.
"2" is just plain wrong
"2" is just plain
correct, and
obviously true ( and equivalent to equivalently and plainly correct and obviously true point 3., stated afterwards ) - because, otherwise, we would nt use any collar at all !
However, I believe that you simply had not understood the sentences of points "2" and "3" - perhaps because you had not noticed the word "once", or perhaps because they are not
written correctly - their
meaning is unambiguous, and can not be argued...
Now, I see that the rather simple "
thought experiments" (
Gedanken-experiments ) I had suggested were not, for some people, such easy things to "perform" as I had thought they would had been... OK. Then, I will try to say the same things otherwise - and in a form one can verify or falsify, with the help of a "
real" experiment !
Let us tie two bowline-like knots, like the knot shown in Reply#252, and at the attached picture. In those knots, we can either use freely rotating pulleys / "lashing blocks", to simulate the
absence of friction along the line of the collar, or use not-rotating pulleys ( where the axes of the pulleys are "glued", so the lines "feel" friction, as they slide along the grooves of the pulleys ), to simulate the
presence of friction at the area of the collar.
Moreover, in each of the two cases ( the case
without friction, and the case
with friction ), let us do one more differentiation : let us "isolate", from friction, the first, only, leg of the first "bowline", and the second, only, leg of the second "bowline", at the points where they go through the nipping loops, by the device described here :
One might experiment by using some tubes of metal/plastic to give "no friction" at certain points.
( This "isolation" from friction inside the nipping loop may be complete or partial - in the later case, we may just reduce the friction forces around the first leg or the second leg by, say, 50%, so we would have the 100% of the "normal" friction around the one leg and the 50% around the other leg - I describe only the 100% - 0% situation, for clarity ).
So, we have FOUR different cases :
1a. No friction along the collar line - friction at the first, only, nipping point, before the first leg - no friction at the second nipping point, after the second leg.
1b. No friction along the collar line - no friction at the first nipping point, before the first leg - friction at the second, only, nipping point, after the second leg.
2a. Friction along the collar line - friction at the first, only, nipping point, before the first leg - no friction at the second nipping point, after the second leg.
2b. Friction along the collar line - no friction at the first nipping point, before the first leg - friction at the second, only, nipping point, after the second leg.
WHICH bowline-like eyeknots will hold more, in each case, in an tug-of-war type experiment ?
The evaluation I had claimed of the less efficient, secondary, "dumb" way the first leg is nipped, in comparison to the more efficient, "clever" nipping of the second leg, was based on the answer of those experiments.
1a is as efficient as 1b. It does not matter WHERE a line is nipped, if it is nipped
once, and there is no friction anywhere else !
2a slips first=less secure than 2b. Nipping,
once, only
after the second leg of the collar, is more efficient / "clever" than the "dumb" nipping,
once, only
before the first leg of the collar.
1a slips first=less secure than 2a. 1b slips first=less secure than 2b.
Friction along the first leg of the collar, along the rim of the collar, and along the second leg of the collar, does matter !
Clear as mud ?
I can do no more/better !