TooTaci 3mm Wire Rope Kit,Wire Balustrade Kit,Turnbuckle Wire Tensioner Kit,Cable Railing Kit,61M/3mm Stainless Steel Cable Wire Rope with M5 Turnbuckles,Hooks,Crimping Sleeves,Wire Rope Thimbles

 

The TooTaci 60m length of 3mm stainless steel wire cable is excellent. It is so very much longer lasting than modern electro-galvanised solid wire which rusts through in only a few years.

It is not easy to use for a novice; planning, knowledge on how it should be done and special tools can make a great difference to speed of installation and quality of final result.

The turnbuckles work well, but need to be locked with a piece of stiff wire through the eyes and the centre to prevent it unwinding with vibration. With both eyes closed and no hook they have the great advantage of not slipping off if the wire slackens. For both my applications this outweighs apparently convenient hooking into place.

The crimp clamps are OK, but being a dissimilar metal will corrode. This kit does not include the superior bolt-up stainless clamps .

The eye thimbles are effective to protect the cable from chafing, so long as the clamp is close enough to the thimble exits to prevent the thimble falling out of the loop.

To cut the cable without distorting it I ended up tightly binding it with tape and then sawing though the taped section with a fine bladed Junior Hacksaw . The binding kept it in shape so it would fit through the compression clamps after removing the tape.

I used an old Visegrip to compress the alloy clamp, three grooves each leg of the wire with the cutter set not to cut through. It is quick and easy to make it secure with one of these.

I’ve used it in a couple of applications.
1. to hold some old fence-posts back upright again after the recent winds broke out the bottom of their brick sockets.
2. to replace the rusted galvanised wire previously holding my apple espaliers.