A general rule of thumb is you need a length of cord roughly 7 times the length of the finished sinnet. I've personally found that for needle hitching, your need 5 times as much cord as it would take to completely wind around the whatever your covering. You can get large eye, blunt point needles called yarn or jumbo tapestry needles that work wonderfully for half hitching.
P.S. if you want to cover something quickly, a crochet stitch (single, double, or triple) is a lot faster then needle hitching and allows you to work directly off of the spool. No splicing involved.
Edited by Mark_R (08/06/15 07:51 PM)
Edit Reason: spelling
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