I can not ignore the
beautiful pattern of this knot, the perfect symmetry between the "nipping" ( before the eye ) and the "nipped" ( after the eye ) structures, and the way the segments are interwoven - meeting each other at the "right" angle ( 90 degrees, the right angle ) while, at the same time, leaving so much "empty" space in between them ( therefore, making the nub able to absorb a sudden heavy pull, without running the danger to become more compact, and jam ). I believe that, regarding the easiness of untying, this knot might be proven to be better than the also perfectly symmetric but already much more dense and compact
Tweedledee bowline ( no "empty" space there whatsoever ), which runs the danger to become too tightly woven. The clever way of tying it Ruby has devised, with the simple, easy to remember form of the first, before the eye, part, and the alternating over/under reeving of the Working End during the formation of the second, after the eye, part, reduces its complexity a lot. Moreover, I do not see any points during this particular tying procedure where one can do a mistake, like the one that can happen during the tying of the
Tweedledee bowline (1). Tying it the minimum number of times I need to tie in order to understand any knot ( 12... ), my greatest difficulty was always on the two last crossings, the 6th and the 7th : I believe that it is easy to make a mistake there, and go over/under instead of under/over, because the Working End crosses the two legs of the eye, and it is difficult to remember that those crossings should be ignored in the alternating over/under pattern...
In short, Ruby has done a great job, by pointing out a supposedly well known perfectly symmetric bend and loop ( which I, for one, had missed... ), and teaching a not-so-easy but also not terribly complex tying method. I believe this bend and this loop deserve a special place in any knot tyers collection, next to the
Tweedledee bend and loop. Unfortunately, just like the
Tweedledee bowline, the loop is not TIB, and I have came to believe that the versatility of a TIB end-of-line loop is also too much to ignore.
1.
http://igkt.net/sm/index.php?topic=3989.msg28205#msg28205