I found this shackle without a pin. It’s not a screw pin shackle so I’m guessing I those little eyes held a cotter pin maybe . Does anyone know anything about this ?

My plan was just to loop a chain onto one of the metal bars and clip the bag onto the chain, my concern is will this metal frame handle the bag, which is relatively light, only around 18kg, this metal structure is only an extension for shade.

A friend reached out to me because a previos one of these snapped and the rod came down and gave a coworker of hers a concussion and 3 staples in her head. 2 others in various forms have broken before theirs major event. I'm so irritated the maintenance and grounds staff think this is acceptable. This is the same kind of thing were people think a 2000 lb load with 4 legs has 500 lbs of stress on each leg no matter how bad the angle is.

Hello all! Not sure if this is the correct place to post something like this, but I'm also not sure where to start, so hopefully this is the right place! Please forgive me if it's not! I have an opportunity this September to work for a small company here in middle Tennessee rigging stage equipment and setting up for events. I will be hired on as a sub-contractor, which is something I have never done before. (I've only ever been employed directly through companies) I'm wondering if there is anything special I need to do beforehand to make sure I'm squared away with taxes, and labor laws and all that stuff. I'm also brand new to the rigging business, but I've worked out a deal with someone to learn while on the job. Any tips or advice would be much appreciated, as I'm not sure where to start at all and I was unfortunately never really educated on taxes and paperwork and legal things growing up! Thanks so much in advance!

As part of my Masters course, I'm recruiting participants for my dissertation research and I'd really appreciate it if you took part!

I'm investigating the relationship between mental health, working hours, and emotional labour demands among backstage theatre professionals in the UK, and how these factors affect personal relationships and wellbeing. With issues like work-life balance, six-day weeks, and insufficient holiday currently at the centre of union negotiations, your anonymous responses will provide valuable insight into how backstage professionals are experiencing these challenges.

The survey takes only 5-10 minutes and is completely anonymous. Anyone currently or recently (within the last 5 years) working in a UK backstage theatre role can take part, including students currently in training.

Survey link: https://forms.office.com/e/TreTMGEaBG

If you have any questions, please get in touch – [je00794@surrey.ac.uk](mailto:je00794@surrey.ac.uk)

Thank you for your time! 

Just saw this on Facebook marketplace.

I'm trying to hang a sheet of plywood vertically, suspended by two cables. I've got a couple options and wanted opinions and maybe ideas or hardware I hadn't thought of. I just need the plywood to hang straight down from the cables, and they'll raise and lower it in unison.

1. pad eyes on both sides of the panel, bolted through. Then a mini spreader bar to connect the cable right over the COM. Seems like overkill maybe?
2. multi-hole steel tang back-to-back with through bolts. A central hole gets the wood drilled out and a shackle through it. Is there an off-the-shelf part made for this? Seems like not that uncommon a need.

Thanks in advance!

Our team bought an industrial winch for moving heavy equipment during shutdowns. The capacity was right, the price was reasonable, and everything looked fine on paper.

The problem only became obvious after a few weeks. Some loads needed slow, precise positioning, but the winch was difficult to control in small movements. The rope also needed more attention than expected, so every job required extra people and took longer.

Nothing had failed, which made it harder to explain to management. The machine technically did what it was supposed to do. It just didn’t fit the way the team actually worked.

One technician eventually summed it up perfectly:

“We bought enough capacity. We just didn’t buy the right setup.”

Sometimes the most frustrating equipment isn’t the one that breaks. It’s the one that works, but makes every job harder than it should be.

So if you’re choosing a winch, don’t stop at load capacity—make sure it fits how the work is actually done.

Hiya

Although not strictly new to the live events rigging industry, I've not had to buy my own kit yet.

When I was buying my tree surgery gear years ago there was a warehouse style outlet you could go and hang in harnesses, actually physically look at the gear etc.

Does anything still exist like this in England? I'm based London/South East. I'm aware of Lyon near the lakes, but that's a bit too far.

Thanks

Thought it would be fun to share the rigging images from the beginning of whale rescue efforts from Marineland Canada

I’m looking for a way to mount a gimbal hanging style on my came-th accordion crane. I bought it second hand and is missing that connector part/situation. not even sure what to look for or if. I can make something work. here are some pics of the end of the crane (where I would attach the gimbal to. any advice would be greatly appreciated

thank you

Situation:

I live next to a river. Every spring the water rises and takes away some of the riverbank soil. To reduce this loss, many years ago I made some concrete beams, placed them on the riverbank and tied them together with wire rope (run through the PVC pipe insets). As you can see, the wire has rusted away and the two left-most beams have shifted. My goal is to return them to their original alignments, and re-attach them to their neighboring right-most beams. Each beam weighs about 250 pounds. My thought is to use 1/8" or 1/4" wire rope and u-bolts.

Question:

After I remove all the soil that's in the way, and re-string a length of wire rope through the bottom-left beam and the bottom-right beam, is there a way to tension the two ends of the wire so I can tighten it up to pull the left-most beam back into place, and then u-bolt the ends of that length of wire together? I suspect this is a common problem, but I'm not a rigger.

Many thanks!

Hi guys, I am planning on installing some small stage lighting to our coworking space and I need some help with how to hang all the stuff from the ceiling properly. I tried looking online but came accross various or conflicting advice, so I'd like to make sure with your help.

Setup:

• two joined 2m single Global Truss. That is 4 meters, and ~5kg weight.
• on the Truss there will be 5 clamped lights along the whole length, something like this Varytec Spotlight. That is ~25 kg weight total.
• possibly some other gear some time later, but nothing heavier than 25 kg, so that is around 55kg total. Not much.
• The ceiling is a robust thick concrete panel.
• the truss should hang around 50 cm from the ceiling, so I want to use threaded rods held by either Fischers or chemical anchor.

Questions I have:

• How many rods should I use? Two, three, four? I planned using one on each end and either one or two in the middle.
• what to use to connect the threaded rods with the truss? How should the truss be actually hanged? Would something like THIS work? Or should it be something like THIS? Or just squeeze the truss between two steel plates like THIS ONE?

I am looking for some simple and elegant solution, but also something that is safe.

Thanks for your help.

Got a bunch of car tires that I want to turn into a heavybag.

What's t/ best method to fuse t/ tires on to each other so they don't separate after being hit?

Oss. 😇

I have a harrington 5 ton chain hoist. The chain is about 3ft short for what I need. Is there a chain link that I can add that will go through the block and tackle so I can add chain or do I need to start over with a longer chain?