Life After One Season for Dock Lines?
Ways to safely extend the life of our dock lines and help keep them out of landfill
By Greg LeBreton
My wife, who does not enjoy docking our boat, has informed me she is even less fond of our dock lines. In fact, she dislikes one of them so much she named it “The Twig.” As the name suggests, The Twig is an inflexible dock line with handling properties of a small branch. My wife strongly suggested we needed to spend the money and get all new dock lines. On this issue she appears about as inflexible as The Twig.
A neighbour of mine buys new dock lines every spring. This got me thinking. If every boater on the water goes through a set of dock lines every season, we’re throwing a lot of nylon (a stretchy kind of plastic) in the garbage. How can we safely extend the life of our dock lines and help keep these out of landfill?
After spending time in water and on dirty docks, lines pick up grit, grow algae, and can become unsightly or worse, inflexible. The good news is you can clean and soften the nylon in your dock lines just like nylon fibres in your clothes. Here’s how. Using a pillowcase or mesh bag, simply soak your dock lines in clean, fresh water overnight then gently wash them in your washing machine. After washing, soak your lines in fresh water with fabric softener. Just be sure to follow the directions on the bottle as too much fabric softener will break down the nylon fibres. Rinse again and leave to dry in indirect sunlight. They should be almost good as new – provided they are not too far gone.
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