I just bought a 500' spool of paracord and want to cut it into convenient lengths. How long should those lengths be?

When a kid, my dad used to carry small bundles of paracord for misc use, but I can't remember how long they were. Maybe 15, 20, or 25 feet??? It seems too long a bundle would get tangled way too easily.

I've heard 50 and 100 feet are useful lengths. I had a 50 foot piece, but I just braided it into a belt, and had 5 feet left over.

I find that for general service like tying up tarps, making bundles etc, a double arm span is about right. Run the rope between your outstreached hands, twice. About 12' or 4m.

For longer pieces, just start winding it up until you get a package that is the size you want to carry. This seems to be the limiting factor for me. No matter how long it is, it will be sometimes too long and other times to short.

Remember that tying a knot to join two ropes will lower the working load by 50%. Depends on the knots of coures, but that is a good working estimate.

I had 300ft originally. After some thought, I cut it into a 100 ft length and four 50 ft lengths.

However, in real life, most of my problems (tying stuff down, etc) lent themselves to shorter lengths. So now I EDC a 10 ft piece with a 20 ft length in my bag. Tightly wound, the first makes a good key fob and the second is barely noticable among my school supplies, yet the two have proved highly useful. For hiking, my car kit, or trips, a 50 length would be appropriate, but a ten and a twenty are fine for daily urban life.

Why do you want to cut the spool up now, if you don't know how you're going to use the pieces (otherwise you'd know how long to make them)?

Just leave the spool in one piece, and cut off lengths as you need them.

Well, the problem with that is, you're not going to be carrying a huge spool of paracord around with you on a daily basis, and the whole point of "EDC" is that you don't know what you're going to need it for when you set out in the morning.

If you're just using it around the house, your suggestion is fine, but you may also want to carry some around with you "just in case". Which is, after all, the point of this forum, no? <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I still don't understand. If you want to EDC a smaller piece of paracord, say 50 feet, then cut 50 feet off your spool and EDC the 50 feet. Now you have a 50 foot piece in your pocket and a 450 foot piece still on the spool. If later you need a 100 foot piece for something, cut that from the spool and have 350 feet left on the spool, etc. I don't see a reason to cut the spool into 10 separate 50 foot pieces ahead of time unless you have uses for all 10 pieces. If you cut the spool into 50 foot pieces and then need a 100 foot piece, you're out of luck. Just cut off what you need when you need it, and leave the rest for when you need more.