Retucking the thief knot

[xarax]

Lucky for me, I guess.

   No, you have not used luck...you have used 1500 words in12 days, to say something you could very well have said with one word in one minute - while you have used 150 words to report your findings for the one of the 6 retucked thief knot bends presented in the original post of this thread. If we keep going with that  pace and effectiveness, we will reach a conclusion after ...you count how many words, pages and years. 
     

[X1]

   A recent exchange of views about another issue, reminded me those ( forgotten ) bends... They are generated by symmetrically re-tucking the thief knot "base", i.e., by driving the working ends once more through this knot s nub, via one of the 5 "openings"  between the segments of the loose knot " base"  - just as it was done with the reef family of knots "base", at (1).
   Just because some of the many combinations of this re-tucking procedure do not lead to a stable knot, it turns out that the total number of the distinct generated bends is only 6. At 4 of them ( the "A" bends), during the re-tucking, the working end enters into an opening by the one side of the loose thief knot "base", and at the other 2 ( the "B" bends ) by the other side. They are shown at the first two posts ( which, fortunately or unfortunately, are the only posts worth reading... because all the next posts were dedicated to the usual nonsense.  )  However, some of those bends need a quite careful dressing, a detailed attention to the relative locations of the knot s strands prior to the final tightening phase - otherwise the subsequent tightening will lead to another knot, or it will not lead to any stable knot at all.
   So, here comes the question : Which of those bends can be considered as "practical" knots ? Although they are equally simple, the fact that some of them need such an attention during the dressing phase, makes me think twice about their "practical" character...
  " I had come to believe that if the dressing of a knot is unstable, i.e. if the knot should be dressed to one stable form that very easily ( by a " tiny tug"  ) degenerates into another, less stable or completely unstable form... then it should not be considered as a "practical" knot. "
   That means that even if a knot is simple, easy to remember and to tie, and secure, it should probably also be such that it can be easily dressed in a stable form - otherwise the ambiguity of the dressing could lead to unstable forms, or to different final knots, that are not secure.
   I will not point out which of those 6 bends are stable, in the sense described above, and which are not - in an effort to persuade the interested reader to tie them all, judge by himself, and enjoy the outcome. 

1. http://igkt.net/sm/index.php?topic=3086.msg18494#msg18494

[SS369]

  a snip...
" I had come to believe that if the dressing of a knot is unstable, i.e. if the knot should be dressed to one stable form that very easily ( by a " tiny tug"  ) degenerates into another, less stable or completely unstable form... then it should not be considered as a "practical" knot. "

I would think that this needs qualifying somewhat.
Is the stable-then-unstable - practical(?) knot under tension when this occurs? If that is the case then it is not necessarily a bad thing if that is the intent. As in a hitch that easy to untie by tugging a part of it.
Does a slipped knot fall into this category as well?

May not be best of breed, but I do find uses for the symmetric Sheet bend. Stable and secure whilst under tension. And I like how easy it will spill when done.

SS

[X1]

I would think that this needs qualifying somewhat.

Indeed ! 

  I can not explain it with words... I was not referring to the Symmetric Sheet bend - although this was what made me think on this issue in the first place. If you tie those 6 bends, you will see what I mean.     
   There are knots where dressing is not needed at all - you just leave an adequate amount of length for the tails to remain inside the knot s nub, and you pull the standing ends . ( I have in mind the Zeppelin bend and the Ashley s bend, because they do not "eat" their tails during tightening - or they eat a very small amount of them). There are knots that should be dressed properly, otherwise they do not lead to a secure form - like the Symmetric Sheet bend, which, if dressed wrongly, leads to its dangerous evil impostor...There are also knots where, during the dressing phase, when the knot is under the minimum tension of our fingers, the strands can be manipulated in a number of ways, so, when the knot is finally tightened, they can be found in a number of places - like some of the bends presented at this thread. The average knot tyer expects a self-dressing knot, where, the moment he sets up the knot, the 99% of the tying has been done. However, only few knots provide this luxury.
   In other words, we can have a simple knot ( a knot that can be set up easily ) and a secure knot (  a knot that will not slip ), but I suspect that, if the dressing of this knot is not quite easy, unambiguous, almost automatic, but demands a certain degree of attention to details, we can not consider it as a "practical" knot. 
    Regarding "practicality", it seems that dressing matters... 

[xarax]

  Two recent pictures of the A1 bend - just for the record. I hope that, someday, somebody would collect, draw tying diagrams and take new pictures of all the bends we know, so that the knot tyer of the future would not have to search for topics that "have not been posted in for at least 120 days.".