Knots

This is a novice question but one that has been bugging me. What knots work the best when tieing your partner down. Currently I use most of the ones I know which are bowline, bunt line hich, ancor and clove hitches. And if I want something to easily shorten or lengthen bondings I will use a taught line hitch or Blake's hitch.

Any advice will be appreciated because I know there has to be knots that are better suited for the situation.

Corius said:

This is a novice question but one that has been bugging me. What knots work the best when tieing your partner down. Currently I use most of the ones I know which are bowline, bunt line hich, ancor and clove hitches. And if I want something to easily shorten or lengthen bondings I will use a taught line hitch or Blake's hitch.

Any advice will be appreciated because I know there has to be knots that are better suited for the situation.

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I don't know if it really matters what knots you use as long as you can get them untied in a hurry, if need be. And keeping some of those EMT scissors that won't cut your skin near by, in case you have to cut the rope is a very good idea.

Also, while scarves and neckties are considered sensual and soft things to tie someone up with, those scissors are really more necessary then. With all of the tugging and struggling some submissives do, the knots in scarves and neckties tend to get tighter and tighter, to the point it's impossible to get them untied. Your only way then is to cut them off.

And you always have to think about what you'd do in a hurry. What if the sub got a leg cramp or something...had to go to the bathroom, or worse yet, passed out? There's after care for when the scene is over, but you sometimes have to worry about DURING care, too. The dom is in charge of the submissive's safety, so thinking of what could go wrong is just as important as thinking about what you want to do to her.

So, to answer your question, I wouldn't know what the best knot is to tie someone up with. I'd guess you know which knots hold the best. I'd just say that you make sure you can untie a knot in a hurry, if you need to. That's the best knot, if you ask me.

Personally, I prefer Velcro over anything else. You can buy boxes of 2 inch Velcro that has sticky on the backs. The two parts of the Velcro can be stuck together with that sticky backing and then you can cut those up into the lengths you want.

You put the soft side against the skin and the hook loop side is on the outside. 2 inches of Velcro wrapped around wrist or ankle, or whatever, they aren't going to be going anywhere.

The best part of Velcro is it holds well and it's easy to get off in a hurry, if need be. I know Home Depot has it in 15 foot boxes and even Walmart does.

Corius said:

This is a novice question but one that has been bugging me. What knots work the best when tieing your partner down. Currently I use most of the ones I know which are bowline, bunt line hich, ancor and clove hitches. And if I want something to easily shorten or lengthen bondings I will use a taught line hitch or Blake's hitch.

Any advice will be appreciated because I know there has to be knots that are better suited for the situation.

Click to expand...

My wife and I are new to the bondage...I know a LOT of knots...but. I tied knots that don't want to come loose. my research into this. You want a knot that will stay but come lose quickly. You don't want a knot that wants to get tighter and tighter

Many knots, hitches, etc can be made "slippery" by doing the last step with a bight (loop) instead of the entire end of the line. One tug, and the knot collapses.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_hitch

Some general considerations here:

Avoid using elastic materials for bondage (bungee cord etc.) The problem with these is that you cannot tie somebody up securely without squeezing them too tightly, which is a Bad Thing.

Pressure equals force divided by area, meaning that the narrower the surface area of your rope, the more it's going to dig in, though you can avoid this by wrapping multiple times.

Like DVS said, always have the means to cut through whatever material you're using for bondage. The advantage of EMT scissors over regular household scissors, craft tools etc. is that they're designed so that you can work them under a rope etc. without digging holes in the skin underneath.

Some knots can capsize (i.e. fail suddenly if you pull one of the ends in the wrong direction) or jam under load, neither of which is desirable in bondage. I'm not an expert in knots, but from googling, looks like all of the ones you mention are prone to jamming, so maybe watch out for that.

My favourite bondage knot is the cat's paw. It has a couple of nice features: it's not prone to jamming, and you can tie or untie it in the middle of a line without needing access to the ends. This means I can fasten the ends to a bedpost/etc. ahead of time, and then just quickly make a cat's head for my partner's wrists at the right moment.

Cinch loops are useful for tying limbs together, or tying limbs to something pole-y (table leg, etc. etc.) You take a length of rope, and wind it round and around both limbs, leaving a little bit of space between the limbs. Tie off the ends, and then wind a second rope around the first, in the space between the limbs, to tighten that loop.

Sites like this might be useful for much more info than I can give: https://crash-restraint.com/

I'm not an expert on knots, but I've found Douglas Kent's Complete Shibari Volume 1 helpful for this purpose, especially if you like the Shibari style of bondage. It may sound daunting, but it's actually a short book full of illustrations and with fairly clear diagrams about how to tie the knots. I use 6 mm hemp rope. I love the look. Hemp is fairly soft and it smells good. I haven't used Jute, but from what I understand it offers and an even cleaner, sharper look, especially for photography.

An advantage of relying upon the shibari style is that the knots used are nearly all quite simple, and they're relatively simple to untie quickly, which is something you really want to be able to. Plus the 6mm rope is not difficult to untie.

Always have scissors on hand that you can use to cut through the rope or whatever you use quickly.

The simplest thing, if you don't want to bother with knots, is to buy a set of padded cuffs that will secure the partner easily and comfortably.