A friend of mine ordered a small neck knife. It came with the standard chunk of leather for a neck cord….did not do the knife justice, so I braided him an adjustable length lanyard. He wanted a loop of about 30” circumference….I made it adjustable by about 8” longer, 3+ inches shorter.
Cut four 70" 1/8" wide kangaroo strings. Grease well.
Tie all four strings skin side up about 10" from one end to a hook or other support.
Do a couple rounds of four plait FLAT braid to align the strings properly.
Then transition to 4-plait round braid
Braid 44+ inches added about 3" to the total length here to allow for the extra needed to girth hitch the sheath.
Remove from the wall support and get ready to do the overbraid.
At this point the overbraid “finger-cuff” joins are started.
Circle up the lanyard, and lay one end over the braided loop…
Start standard 4-plait braid using the lanyard as a core….
Wrap for a total of ten cycles over the existing lanyard.
Then begin terminal knot. In this case start a wall knot.
Then bring each tail around the leg of the neighbor to crown this.
Pull up tight and work back through the overbraid if necessary to tightnen it and the terminal knot using an awl.
At this point wash the lanyard in cool water, roll and pull it into shape.
Let dry then trim tag ends on terminator knots.
This closed loop is then girth hitched to his neck knife sheath.
The double strings behind the neck spread the load also. In the winter this can be made long enough to go over a coat, summer tightened up enough to easily tuck into a tee shirt.
