Anyone know what sort of link this is?

bcp · Sep 29, 2014

Kernopelli said:
Not seen one in years but they seemed very common when I was young.....they're used to repair or join chain(s).

Me, too. Haven't seen them for somewhere between 8 and an infinite number of years.

Bruce

chim · Sep 30, 2014

I figured it was some sort of repair link. My goal was to find a source for them. Never saw a Menards in this area. Thanks for the tip.

Capricious · Sep 30, 2014

chim said:
A bud has these two and doesn't know where they came from or what they're called. One is marked "1/4" and the other "1/2". No names, but the 1/2" link has a stylized "A" and a symbol that looks a bit like the Swiss cross. They're handy to use as light duty no-snag clevises.

I have a couple of those in the "junk box."

I think I have seen them in the local hardware store.

By the way, what I have seen others here call a "clevis," I call a '"shackle," or more accurately, a "screw pin shackle" (to differentiate from a "loose pin" shackle)

Xfaxman · Sep 30, 2014

Capricious said:
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By the way, what I have seen others here call a "clevis," I call a '"shackle," or more accurately, a "screw pin shackle" (to differentiate from a "loose pin" shackle)

I guess it depends on where you live. For me it has always been a clevis.

Shackles are for prisoners.

Capricious · Sep 30, 2014

Xfaxman said:
I guess it depends on where you live. For me it has always been a clevis.

View attachment 392700

Shackles are for prisoners.
View attachment 392701

Shackle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Which I could figure out what those things the OP was asking about, are called. I know I have a couple.

Capricious · Sep 30, 2014

"Figure 8 Connectors"

McMaster-Carr

part # 3346T21

Capricious · Sep 30, 2014

On the subject of "clevis," I use what are called "double clevis" connectors (sometimes called "twin clevis") at the tops of the home-brew limit chains on my rotary cutter:

Gary Fowler · Sep 30, 2014

Xfaxman said:
I guess it depends on where you live. For me it has always been a clevis.

View attachment 392700

Shackles are for prisoners.
View attachment 392701

I think if you are on a farm it is a clevis, a left over term from old mule farming days.

If you are talking to a rigger, then it is a shackle for joining or holding together multiple cables for lifting. For heavy lifts, you almost always use a shackle rather than just hooking on the cable loops to the crane. I have seen shackles so big that they need a cherry picker to lift up the pin to go in the shackle and the rigger needs both hands to hold the nut that weighs over 50# to screw on the pin.

NOTE: The larger shackles have a thru pin rather than threaded into the shackle itself.

Capricious · Sep 30, 2014

Gary Fowler said:
I think if you are on a farm it is a clevis, a left over term from old mule farming days.

If you are talking to a rigger, then it is a shackle for joining or holding together multiple cables for lifting. For heavy lifts, you almost always use a shackle rather than just hooking on the cable loops to the crane. I have seen shackles so big that they need a cherry picker to lift up the pin to go in the shackle and the rigger needs both hands to hold the nut that weighs over 50# to screw on the pin.

NOTE: The larger shackles have a thru pin rather than threaded into the shackle itself.

Another industry where it would be "shackle" would be the marine industry. I spent a fair portion of my youth "laying barge rigging", as shown in this photo from a Coast Guard web site. This is how barges are tied together on rivers/intracoastal (unless the wimps are using winches instead of "hard rigging")

They have a shackle inbetween the "wire" and the "chain links"

EDITED TO ADD: They really don't have that rigging in the photo set-up right, but then it's the Coast Guard and they don't do that sort of thing for a living. There really isn't any reason to have that section of "chain links" between the shackle and the pelican hook of the ratchet- the eye of the wire should be hooked right into the pelican hook. They could have "jerked" that ratchet, or "run it out" a bit if they needed a few inches more slack.