Household Essentials Clothesline Tightener, Silver

Shipped fast, works as described, best thing it only takes one person to connect the line.

.The items arrived promptly and well packaged.This is the type of thing where a little preparation pays off by eliminating a whole lot of frustration. Once you get past the challenge of getting the rope through the tightener the device works very well indeed.The instructions on the back of the card are really vague, basically telling you to stick the rope through the Clothesline Tightener (Duh!) and giving you a recommended means of using it, which in my case was different than what I intended.The problem, which you will see a number of frustrated comments about, is the actual feeding of the rope through the tightener.As has been noted; wrapping the end of the rope with a piece of tape helps because it stiffens the end of the rope, but it can still be a bit of a challenge getting past the three ball bearings that are intended to lock onto the rope. What I will show you how to do takes the tape method one step further and make it even easier.I will list the instructions here, and post this same list with links to photos in the comment section of this review.Supplies:Clothesline Tightener (Duh! x 2)Clothesline rope - mine is about 5/16" thickAdhesive tape - I used duct tape7 or 8 inch piece of metal wire - I used a thin steel wire similar to bailing wire1 - Tear off a 2 inch strip of duct tape; you want to have enough tape to wrap around the end of the rope a few times, but not so much that it makes the rope too thick to fit through.2 - Place the piece of metal wire along the end of the piece of rope with at least 3 inches or so extending past the end of the rope.3 - Tightly wrap the duct tape around the end of the rope and the wire.4 - Fold the lower length of wire up towards the other and twist the 2 ends of the wire tightly against the end of the rope5 - Twist the 2 ends of the wire together; in effect creating a long tail.6 - Pull back the metal sleeve of the tightener and push the wire tail through till the taped end of the rope is at least between the ball bearings, twisting helps.7 - Keeping the sleeve pulled back, now pull the wire tail till the rest of the rope emerges.8 - Cut off the end of the rope with the metal tail. And hang the tightener/rope in whatever fashion you desire.Time lapsed: 1 minute.Have a Magical Day!!

this works great for tightening a clothesline when it eventually stretches.I have been using it for years and it still works fine.

Works pretty good, so far.

It works exactly how its intended. Seems strong and durable but I will update if it breaks down. It sits outside in the elements all the time on my clothesline

It works perfectly

I have had a lot of trouble with this tensioner. It arrived with chunks of metal shavings on the ball bearings (which are supposed to grip the laundry line). I used a 1/8" cotton clothesline (the minimum recommended) and had a tough time getting the rope ends through the tensioner, but I figured that was a good thing since it would be nice and tight and not let the line slip.From the start, I could never get the line completely taut. Sometimes, one of the ball bearings would push the inner cylinder crooked so the end of the inner cylinder got caught on the outer housing not letting it slide all the way through. This meant the ball bearings weren't closing tightly around the line. But even when they were closed, the line would slip a little.After 4 or 5 sagging uses, the line now slides through the ball bearings and is useless. I didn't clean the shavings off the ball bearings initially, so that may have damaged the cotton fibers in the line. Or perhaps the line just stretched and thinned from the load of laundry hanging on it. To be fair, I have a 50' line which may be asking too much. I will try to find a thicker laundry line and try again after cleaning away the metal shavings.The size of the tensioner looks nice, but the main body is only 1.5" long. Only two fingers can fit on it. It takes a lot of force to release the tension, so a four finger grip would be preferable. I wish they made the body an inch longer.I'm not giving up completely on this item, but so far I can only recommend using it with a shorter laundry line and a thicker diameter rope. And clean away the metal shavings first.

Keeps line tight. Good quality. Made in China.