Firstly, the rope, it does end up being quite a lot, move the piston to the very bottom of it's stroke, and fill from the top, you can also twist it slowly as you do, to try and coil it in the cylinder, preventing it jamming in the ports.
And as for the blades, no, i do not, sorry for the confusion, I do however find that often when I have applied what I feel to be decent pressure for the job, the blades indeed will not move by hand, and when you consider other methods of engine protection use sheer pins, you can see the blades dont need all that much freedom.
