more construction; trapeze upgrade

So i finally got around to upgrading my trapeze. The previous one i had built did not have bar ends, and i eventually decided that i really wanted them. So finally one night i went down into the shop with the intention of cutting and grooving a new replacement bar, and then disassembling my trapeze and swapping the new bar in. But the original trapeze had been a prototype design to begin with, and in the time since i had built it i had come up with several design improvements. Plus, the original bar was 1-1/8th inch, and was pretty darned heavy already. So instead of simply swapping the bar out on the original trap, i decided to do a complete do-over and produce Trapeze Design Rev 3, with a 1 inch diameter bar. (Rev 2 was only on paper, and never built.)

The new trapeze is a cable core design, which uses a two-part donut-like assembly which acts as both a rope thimble and a captive collar for the wire rope core. The cable passes through this assembly, around a groove in the bar, and back out again. The rope is then passed around the thimble part of the donut and backspliced into itself, about 6 inches away from the thimble (so you can undo it and inspect the cabling without needing to undo the splice). Rope eye is then lashed together and down to the bar. Cable is 3/16ths 7x19 construction, vinyl coated. Rope is 3/4 nylon 3-strand laid.

Much of this process i took photos of. So, much like the recent entry about the hoop, here is a photo log of its fabrication. Some of the assembly was done at craft nights at other folks houses, which is why there are so many different backgrounds in these shots :-)

( Construction log follows )

( Assembly )

Finished product here: