570 
Philippine Journal of Science 
1919 
time he was Minister of the French Marine show that the more 
tightly a rope was twisted the lower was its tensile strength. 
Rope that was comparatively loosely twisted was more pliable, 
less liable to run into kinks, and at least 25 per cent stronger 
than rope more tightly twisted. 
The more tightly the fiber is twisted in making a rope, the 
harder and more rigid will the rope become. Excessive twist- 
ing is injurious, and the fiber may be so tightly twisted that 
it is stressed very nearly to the point of rupture, in consequence 
of which the rope is unable to bear much load. The twist that 
different fibers will stand without losing too much of their 
original strength varies with the material. 
The twist in all the ropes tested, or the length of one com- 
plete turn of a strand, was measured by placing a scale parallel 
to the longitudinal axis of the rope. In fig. 2 the distance T 
a 
b 
c 
Fig. 2. Showing' the twist of two-, three-, and four-strand ropes, respectively. 
is considered the length of the twist. The values given in Table 
II are the means of five measurements, and show the relation- 
ship between the twist and the girth of the ropes tested. Frac- 
tions of a millimeter less than 0.5 have been dropped and those 
0.5 or more have been counted as 1 millimeter. 
