The twist braid has been used for hundreds of years as the preferred method to make rope by hand.
It allows you to increase the strength of your cord by increasing the amount of fibers in each inch of length.
This is a critical step in making natural cordage, think of it as the first step.
So first off gather your 3 equal lengths of cord and tie a knot in the end to hold them together. You can Whip the cord together if you know how to do that, if not we can cover that later.
Now you can start your braid, it is very simple. You twist each strand the opposite direction that you twist all the strands together. So, twist the right most strand to the right, while passing the whole strand to the left over the other 2. Continue doing this for the whole length of cord. I made a picture showing the twist and the lay over .
here are a few other pictures of the simple 3 strand twist
550 cord become 1650, you can keep building up the cord to increase the strength. Below are some pictured of the process repeated to make 9 total strands 4950 pounds.
So the challenge is to make a 3 foot length of 3 strand twist.
