Hi Even and hi to Willeke!
Thanks for the mention of my work on Mar Chele, a trawler in Wilmington, California. There were three methods that I used to cover the rails, all of which are shown in Hervey Garrett Smith's book "The Marlinespike Sailor". One style takes all three strands each time and half-hitch them together first to the left and then to the right. This is seen in the finish on the right of the photograph. On the left side of the photograph, each of the three strands is taken one at a time instead and half-hitched around the pole, first each of the three to the left and then each of the three to the right. The third method is to again use three strands and half-hitch the first to the left, the second to the right, the third to the left, the fourth (the original first) to the right and so on. The third method is on the trawler, just not in the photograph link. The third method raises a plat or braid on the top of what appears to be serving over the rail. I used a #36 white nylon seine twine for all three coverings and then finished off the ends with TH's. Someone very helpfully wrote to me offering to tell me how to tie a T-shaped TH over the rail junction - I asked the owner what he wanted first, of course, and he wanted to still see the rail there, so I went with a regular TH instead and the owner was very satisfied. I tried polyester cord, but it kept on coming loose as I went, not having got a sticky surface on the rail and the cord did not stretch like nylon does. Let me know if you want to know more!
Lindsey
