Ideal Rope for Bondage

Postby Antonius97 » Sat Jun 08, 2013 8:00 pm

I haven't seen a topic dedicated to this, so I figured I'd make one.
At some point during the summer, I intend to go out to my local Home Depot and buy some rope, for obvious uses :tied: . Before I do so, though, I figure I should ask some people with a little more expertise than me (that'd be you all) what the ideal kind of rope to use for bondage is. Diameter, material, intended use, etc, the more information, the better!
I didn't choose the TUG life, the TUG life chose me.

Re: Ideal Rope for Bondage

Postby Rope_guy » Sat Jun 08, 2013 10:53 pm

I know many people's favorite rope for tying up is hemp rope, but that not easy to obtain and can feel rough to a beginner. There's other ropes such as cotton that are used for bondage. I'd stay away from nylon and other ropes made of synthetic material. They don't have the feel of ropes made of natural fibers. For diameter, at least a quarter inch since less than that can cause injury from cutting. A half-inch diameter rope is probably the most ideal diameter.

Re: Ideal Rope for Bondage

Postby drawscore » Sun Jun 09, 2013 12:25 am

The smaller the diameter of the rope, the tighter it will tie. About the smallest you'd want to go, is 1/8th of an inch sash cord, used mainly in Venetian blinds. About that same size, is rawhide, which is available at sporting goods stores in re-stringing kits for baseball gloves, and in outdoor shops as boot laces.

Conversely, the larger the diameter, the easier it is to escape, simply because you can't tie it as tight as a smaller diameter rope, and you leave a lot of slack. Professional escape artists know this, and when audience members are invited to come on stage to tie him up, he will usually provide them with rope 3/8ths of an inch in diameter, or larger. To give him even more of an edge, the rope will be new, and it will be in one piece, usually 50 feet long.

The most common, and most widely used, is 1/4 inch cotton clothesline.

Drawscore

Re: Ideal Rope for Bondage

Postby Panda » Sun Jun 09, 2013 5:27 am

The best rope I used for a while which was easy to find and cheap was 1/8 inch cotton clothes line (which you can buy pretty much anywhere) and 3/8 inch nylon parachute/utility cord (which you can usually find in any local camping store). This isn't to be confused with polypropylene utility cord with a nylon core which is pretty much useless for bondage, actually if it's polypropylene rope just don't buy it. It's garbage. I don't have much experience with hemp rope, I've been tied up with sisal before and I don't enjoy it. It's scratchy and painful when you struggle.

Lately my good ropes consist of static climbing grade ropes, dynamic ropes for climbing aren't very good for bondage as they have some elasticity (designed that to absorb the impact from your fall). However Static ropes don't have this problem with elasticity and can be quite flexible, especially when used often. I usually stick to a 3/8 inch for intricate bondage of hands and feet and a 1/4 inch static for the body or tying someone up to another object.

The biggest problem I had with 1/8 inch clothes line and the 3/8 nylon parachute cord was the ropes would frequently cut off my circulation. The benefit of having larger diameter ropes is the ropes cover more surface area on your skin and disperse the tension evenly, if you're experiencing problems with pins and needles during bondage you might want to look for thicker ropes... or better technique.