My friend Tom Blakey, aka @prepared_pathfinder has shared some photos of the new Loop Line he received from TRC Outdoors. TRC Outdoors refers to theirs as a Jungle Loop Line but we just called it a Loop Line. I hadn’t seen one of these in years, it’s great that someone is still making them. When I was in the Army in the late 80s and early 90s a Loop Line was an essential bit of kit.
For some time, guys ran around with a 12′ hank of GI climbing rope to do some of the things you could do with a Loop Line. Before that the British Toggle Ropes were all the rage.
It’s a piece of 1” tubular nylon with a loop sewn at either end. Many were remanufactured from lowering lines. Although often, guys would just throw a length of tubular nylon in their butt pack and tie off loops at the end if needed. Oddly enough, Natick made a run of them in-house and I somehow got ahold of it and carried it on my kit until I went into the Air Force.
It could be used anytime you needed a line, either alone or in conjunction with other Loop Lines. You combined them by tying a girth hitch in the loops and could make a line as long as needed for something like a river crossing. This way, each member of a patrol could contribute to a longer line without burning one guy with a whole coil. It could also be used to make an individual rappelling Swiss seat and is more comfortable than using US GI rope. Other uses include lashing down tarps, securing poncho shelters, etc. A Loop Line is one of those multi-purpose items you get a lot of use of on a long patrol.
Here’s an older video by Prepared Pathfinder.
The TRC Outdoor model comes with a DMM Carabiner and a laser cut laminate, PALS compatible carrier, Tom’s is in Tigerstripe and I am jealous. The ones on offer come in either Multicamo or Ranger Green.
trcoutdoors.com/product/jungle-loop-line
The old british rope and toggle system has been used recently by bushcrafters, but with paracord and smaller toggle, Dave Canterbury uses a lot with short hanks of paracord, i keep 2 in my kit for tree webbing for use with hammock, bit its kept loose for otehr puposes, Mors Kochanski used mule tape or lamp wick webbing for a similar purpose, this was popular with old trapeprs and explorers in canda. The british rope and toggle rope used by commandos was used as a garotte as to quote a member of the SAS, “the commandos were a bunch of murderers and would use anything as a weapon”
Great feedback. I hadn’t seen the paracord and toggle setup.
I’m surprised more companies haven’t designed tubular nylon management systems. Everyone carry’s it now. I too carried the lowering line in its case with the aluminum QR cut off. SFARETEC taught the whole section on using 1” tubular nylon for climbing and lowering guys in the urban environment and medical extraction. I carried the 20’ of 1” for a long time after that but then switched to 1/2”. 40’ of 1/2” fits in the same space but is long enough for a single length to be used from second story heights if it’s just you or a single loop can be used by two people to pull one up.
I’m with you. I’ve been surprised that for so long, we’ve just had guys running around with tubular nylon strapped to their carriers.
I’ve been using an LBT Slap Charge pouch for 24′ of nylon. I like your idea of switching to 1/2″.
I carried one of these for most of my career. I still have several. I would steal as many unserviceable lowering lines as I could get from Supply Rooms and Rigger Sheds and then modify and distribute them to my guys. Nothing better as a climbing aid or to hoist items. For medevac they could be made into a figure 8 and used for piggybacking a causality. Not to mention an assist for litter carries, a travois, or just a drag line. I did not know Natick or anyone else ever manufactured them. Great piece of timeless kit. I would certainly still recommend it today for all the reasons mentioned in the article and the comments.
TLB
Am I the only who doesnt get it?
If I want something super strong, light, long, easy to store, for non HighAngle applications, I pick simple 1mm UHMWPE Fibres like Dyneema. Got actually ~40m with my infantry kit, using prerigged for tarps, stove pipe, shelter camo…
For everything HighAngle dont do these stupid DIY SHTF MultiPurpose stuff. Get a decent fall-arrest/climbing rated harness. End of the story. Get some certified 7-8mm Emergency Abseiling Line. There you go, 15-25kN certified stuff.
Should I do some tensile testing of your cool tubular webbing with a couple of knots it? If it wont cut your arteries in a factor 2 fall (not Abseiling, but lead climbing), it will certainly break.
There are plenty of papers and youtubers proofing all day long exactly that: Even a Figure of 8, and a couple of other Yosemite variations like the the Yosemite Bownline, are doing horrible on rope sheering, lowering your tensile strength to 80% with every single knot!
So nope. All this is stupid, non HighAngle Solution stuff. Not certified. Not able to be certified. Its too much to do all. Tubular Line, rated, as just a line – yes. But not these emergency harness bulls that you are trying to sell when an entire rated sport climbing harness from UHMWPE is less than 100g/3oz!!!
To answer your question, I do think you are missing something. The product is named/primarily intended for operations in a jungle environment. Your focus seems to be high angle with a little bit of patrol base admin. From the high angle perspective you are spot on. I like watching the HowNOT2 guys on YouTube. Love their destructive testing stuff. With regards to the Jungle, you’d almost have to attend a military jungle warfare course to get it. The old JOTB in Panama taught some amazing techniques using equipment similar to this. I’d much prefer a manufactured seat for high angle as well. However, I can’t use one to build a rope bridge in the jungle. JOTB also taught never to carry more than 20% of your body weight in the jungle. For that reason you didn’t carry much specialized equipment. Everything was multipurpose because it was difficult to carry a fighting load and stay light. Don’t know much about the new course in Hawaii. I can tell you Hawaii is nothing like real jungle. I doubt the course can achieve the same impact as Ft Sherman did.
Great response! Thanks for your effort.
As I dont have any jungle expirience and never will, I can see your concept of special occasions require special solutions.
Quoting 20% weight limit immidiatly gives me insight, as I am aware of the 30% cap we got with “EDC Mountaineering” and 50% with shelter/prolonged equipment – which is not sustainable to carry.
But I am glad my usecase of mountaineering, lead climbing and HAI in an LE environment didnt betray me and stopped me from falling for the “tacticool multipurpose” idea of this product but beeing sceptic if it suits me.
It doesnt suit me 🙂 but since your reply I am seeing it maybe does for something I got no cash in.
I’ve used a Loop Line loads of times in mountain environments as well as in the jungle whilst serving. It safely does the job of a climbing or abseil harness, without having to carry heavy, one purpose only gear.
The whole idea of this item is that it is multi use, therefore cuts down weight on having to carry multiple items that can only be used for one task each.
Hmmm, anybody know if there are any rappel techniques using tubular webbing as a line. I’ve never seen it, but i could see this being an expedient 4m rappel line (or 8 if you leave the webbing), but im not sure there are any ways to make a friction hitch on a carbiner with webbing.
If you look into some personal escape kits that CMC and others make you’ll see narrow webbing being used with specialized descenders. I don’t think a Munter hitch would work so well.
A simple Munter hitch will work, super munter if needed for the extra weight.
Link to trcoutdoors is dead.
Works just fine for me.