550 Cord Revisited

Tue Aug 7 2007

The always useful 550 cord (parachute cord) has many uses and will continue to have more. It's been around for many years (since WW2) and continues to be an important and useful tool. 550 cord is a Kernmantle rope which is a rope constructed with its interior core (the kern) protected with a woven exterior sheath (mantle) This design provides strength, durability, and flexibility.

	Loose cord is a pain, spooling it up or wrapping it in bundles lets you grab whole cords without sorting out a tangle
	Some cord is made in the USA, full strength and made of real materials, other stuff is made in China. The real USA made 550 cord is the darker orange in these pictures. It has nylon braided interior cords, The Chinese type has just four inside cords that fray easily and have much less strength
	Differences in the color of the two also. The brighter orange is the USA made called "safety orange"
	To roll or to spool? It's up to you, but either is better than loose cord
	Three popular military colors are (top to bottom) Desert Tan, Gray (ACU) and OD green
	Using a simple square braid, it's easy to make an emergency rope much smaller for storage. When needed just unbraid the two ropes.
	Loose cord is a pain to use, but is much smaller than cord wrapped on a spool.
	A simple spool can be made out of just about anything. I used the foam from a discarded box of ammo
	550 cord can be disassembled. The outer sheath can be used alone, as well as the smaller inner cords. Cut the 550 cord and look at the ends, you'll see it's easy to get the inner cords to push out. Then grab them and pull off the outer shell like a snake shedding it's skin.
	Once the outer sheath is removed the inner strands (usually 7 cords) usually get all tangled right away. So I usually tie the ends and then tie a loose overhand knot every so often to keep the strands together
	To keep the sheath from unwrapping, melt the ends with a lighter
	One use for a few feet of 550 cord is to turn a compass pouch into a handy small bag for the pack. With the cord attached the small pouch can be worn around the neck as a travel wallet, or easily found if lost in a larger pack
	When an item has a hole too small for 550 cord, a few strands of the interior cord can be used. I melted together the ends of a few strands
	This way this small knife can still have a loop of cord which is many times stronger than the cheap key chain it came with. A loop of 550 cord on a small roll of tape