By pre-stretching, the steel wire rope is loaded to approx. 45% of its nominal tensile strength, during the course of which the steel wire rope’s construction elongation is removed. The removal of the construction elongation pre-supposes that the steel wire rope is not subjected to further treatment! If there is further treatment, the steel wire rope will more or less return to its original form. However, pre-stretching is in many cases a good idea anyway as it means that the steel wire rope more rapidly ceases its constructional elongation.
However, in many instances pre-stretching can still be beneficial, as the steel wire rope’s constructional elongation will thus be completed much more quickly. This in turn means that the steel wire rope does not need to be re-tightened many times.