aargh.... know about knots?

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e9999

e9999

Gotta get out there...
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got myself a nice length of marine rope that I want to use for yard work. I think it's a double braided nylon or polyester (feels like cotton or fabric material) mooring line, about 1/2" or 5/8" in diameter. Has some color strands in it, otherwise mostly whitish. Unfortunately, it was apparently used to attach or tow a boat by a landlubber and there are several overhand knots along the length that are very tight. I want to untie these so I can use the rope without knots. I spent close to a half hour on the first one, while wet, probing at it with a pick, tugging, trying to move stuff around and nothing...

So, any advice on how to untie a really tight overhand knot in this kind of rope? Wet or dry? Oil? Silicone? Cold? Hot? Pick? Pliers? It better take much less than 1/2 hr each while not damaging the rope or I'm cutting this thing in 5' sections and use it for decoration on my roof rack or trailer...

Any thought (well, besides the latter bit)?
 
All lines lose strength after overhand knots are tied into it and then tensioned.

I've used needle nose pliers and pliers with some success. If the knot is too tight, it's impossible to untie it. And if it takes a Herculean effort to untie it, the line will be kinda worthless. Not very strong.
 
yes, I used my pick like a Fid but that didn't help much. I do have toothless visegrips, maybe that would do. And I was thinking about trying to hold one loop of the knot in a vise with soft jaws and hammering the other loop off.
You think it's better to do it wet or dry?
 
Maybe try soapy water? I never have. We know that the strands are going to have to slide by each other, so lubrication would be good, but I wonder if it would cause it to swell and lock up tighter?

We all know that leather shrinks when it dries and expands when wet, obviously nylon line doesn't absorb water (petroleum).

Don't know.
 
A good Marlin spike and warm soapy water. I raced on ocean sailboats as a young man, have had to untie knots in many a sheet or line. Just takes patience.

I got a free pair of snatch straps that were tied together on the bet I couldn't get them apart after pulling an 80 out of wet sand. Took me an hour but it finally came loose.
 
thanks all.
well, I did it.
And very easily at that. I tried the bit about the vise and hammer and it worked beautifully. It didn't take more than a minute per knot for most and maybe a couple for the very worst one. I even was able to untie a tight double layer overhand in a twisted polymer rope in 3 or 4 minutes.
I just grabbed one of the 2 loops in the vise and hammered off the other one with a plastic hammer, then alternated. Repeated 3 or 4 times. Easy as pie. The line looks just fine and will serve well.
I did that dry, maybe that helped too.
I really think that they would have been impossible or at best extremely time-consuming to do by hand. There just isn't anything much to hold on to.
 
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I found that using an ice pick and putting the rope in a vice helped greatly. I would put the rope ends in the vice, then work the pick in the knot and put some pressure against the loops of the knot. It took some time, but did work and did not damage my rope.
 
Good job, I would have lost my patience and used a hatchet.
 
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