FYI, for the adventurous, you can make your own hand crimp SS lifelines. I've made lifelines with both a wrench swage and a Loos hand swage tool. I have the Loos tool. I got it off eBay for about $60. It sells normally for around $250-300.
Couple of points here. 1. The cost savings is offset by the aethetics of hand swage fittings. Machine swage fittings look much better. Over the 10-20 year life of a lifeline, the $$ difference isn't much. When a customer asks me for an estimate, they, more often than not, either choose to do nothing or have a local rigging shop make them rather than hire me to do it. 2. Making your own lifelines is a pain in the butt. If you measure incorrectly, the $$ you lose in a fitting or a length of lifeline will probably offset your savings. 3. Buying a Loos swage tool on eBay may sound good but a word of caution. Many of them are well used tools from professional installers that may have excess clearance. If the tool can't properly compress the fitting, one or more of your crew is going over the side when it lets go. 4. Hand swage fittings tend to bend a bit when you swage them. This is particularly true of the cheap wrench swage tool. Machine swage fittings are genrally straight although I have seen a few with a slight bend. My recommendation is that you strip all the lifelines and take them to a pro to have them duplicated. In many cases, you can re-use fittings that only require a new threaded stud. My 2 cents worth. Dennis C. Touche' 35-1 #83 Mandeville, LA
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