Make a ZiplIne at Home

Zack and Wendi

Building a ZIPLINE

WRITERPHOTOS/ Wendi Hartup

I officially now have a teenager in the house. The challenge now seems to be how to get him excited about anything. It was so easy when he was younger but something happened and now computer games or YouTube (sometimes both at the same time) seem to capture his attention. Sure I can get him to do things if I make him but that eagerness to do anything, most especially with me, is reduced. I'm all about making memories rather than buying so much stuff these days.For his 13th birthday this year I took him to a zipline place. We had a pretty good time and it was over before we knew it. We were reminiscing about the experience a few weeks later with some friends. They mentioned they had a zipline sitting in the garage from a neighbor that moved and wondered if we would like it since they didn't have any trees that would work. Zach got a little smile and I said yes! It would be a few more weeks before we started the process of deciding exactly where we would put this up in the backyard and figuring out what was missing from the kit.

Here's the thing...if you want to do this, please do some research first. You need two trees at least a foot in diameter. We selected some that are 85 feet apart. I learned we needed to have a slope less than 8% between trees. Due to my son's height we needed the zipline to be at least 12 feet on one tree and 10 feet on the other. This meant we had to either have a rope ladder or build a platform on the high side. I found some really great instructions on YouTube for building a platform. I think I watched the video 10 times to decide exactly how I wanted to copy it. We talked about how wide we wanted the platform and did a lot of measuring at the tree. Of course once we found instructions, he wanted to get to building right away. Wow, something he was excited about! Of course we had to do a bit of clearing, move the fence around the tree we were using, cut some branches, move the firepit and basically do a bunch of yard work he was not expecting. We both ended up getting a few spots of poison ivy from the vine near where we worked. We got some discount outdoor wood at the hardware store (our local place has a purple marked section where it was 80% off!) along with deck blocks and all kinds of brackets. I don't own a truck so we had some things precut at the hardware store. It was fun to build this together but it really took us all day. We pre-drilled all the holes and used screws. It was a lot of trial and error with making sure everything was level to start. We probably overbuilt the platform but it is very sturdy. I think we spent about $100 total for the deck blocks, wood, screws and brackets.

The kit we got from my friends was missing some cable clamps, a turnbuckle to tighten the cable and the cable itself was a bit rusty. I had no idea how to measure the diameter of the cable without taking the whole thing to the hardware store. Also carrying around that thing required wearing gloves because the cable has sharp edges. So instead I decided to just order a new kit. I looked at several websites for reviews of various kits and settled on one that fit my budget as well as the length we wanted to string across the backyard. We got a kit that covers 98 feet and holds a person that weighs up to 250 pounds for about $120. It came with tree guards, a rust proof cable, a trolley with handlebars, a seat that can easily adjust heights on the rope, a sturdy carabiner to connect the rope to the trolley, a sling cable, a turnbuckle, cable clamps, a spring brake and a manual. Mine even came with a wrench to tighten the cable clamps. I wouldn't try to piece this together from local hardware stores because there are so many kits available online or you can ask your local hardware