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Cables & Wires deliberately tangle themselves. It's scientfic!


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From CRACKED.COM:

 

 

#5. Wires That Get Tangled in Storage

 

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You stuff your headphones into your pocket, take them out half an hour later and curse as you try to untie a knot that looks like it was impossible to have formed on its own, like you have tiny knot-tying elves in your pockets trying to screw with you.

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We don't care what Dr. Jonas says. It's the elves, dammit!

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It's the same with your computer cables, and the Christmas lights in your attic, and your garden hose. In fact, everything in your home that is capable of twisting into a knot seems to be involved in a giant conspiracy against your sanity. And it always pisses you off, because there's no reason for it -- why would a bunch of wire that was in a nice loop when you stored it suddenly be a tangled mess later?

The Science:

Don't think that science has just been asleep at the wheel on this one; there is an entire mathematical discipline that specializes in how seemingly random tangles form. Knot theory is in fact one of the more popular pastimes among the mathematically well-endowed, and it focuses entirely on the "How the hell do things get tangled?" dilemma.

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"I don't see how my nudity helps this experiment in any way."

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And here's what they have found out: It is a near-mathematical certainty that a wire/string/hose/etc. of any length will knot in storage. To put it simply (and it gets infinitely complicated), there is only one way for a cable to be straight, but a massive number of ways it can get tangled. Scientists have found literally hundreds of separate, unique types of individual knot, or "prime knots," and they can be combined in infinite ways. You could go your whole life and never see the same knot twice.

So any time you have a bunch of long, flexible objects (or, in the garden hose scenario, one really long object in multiple loops), the objects link in a number of places. When there's enough contact points, and the objects are long and slim enough, the chances for these objects not getting into one of those trillions of knot states is downright astronomical. The more contact points, the more possible knotted states.

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At some point, it's just easier to use a bowie knife and buy a shitload of cords.

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So even a little motion -- jostling the box of Christmas lights when you move it, a change in temperature causing your garden hose to shrink a tiny bit -- makes those states catastrophically accumulate, often within seconds. Put the headphones in your backpack, walk across campus, boom: You have descended into knot hell.

Can It Be Fixed?

Yes and no.

The actual knotting will happen no matter what. Sure, the crucial element is motion, so restricting that by neatly arranging the cables and securing them with, say, cable clips will do the trick. But if you are the kind of person who considers that an option, chances are your cables are neatly arranged and alphabetized already.

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Which is widely considered an early warning sign of sociopathy.

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If the movement can't be restricted, like with those headphone cables, you can either muster up the patience and technique to roll them up neatly or, failing that, just bury them at the bottom of the bag under something heavy and hope for the best.

 

 

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Cables can actually eat people.

:D :D :D

 

 

 

My old live echo loop act I did starting in 1991 had, at its peak, about 90 cables, including signal and power. Even leaving as much prepatched as possible in my rack boxes, setup was a long grind. I did minimize my suffering by being very disciplined about cables, for the most part. Proper coiling, everything with its own cable tie of some kind.

 

Basically you'd go into a variation of the Stockholm Syndrome someplace in the middle of breakdown when you really, really wanted to be safe at home with your gear put away and your feet up in front of the late, late, late show... head down, coiling, coiling, coiling...

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I recently reviewed the American Stage cables from Planet Waves. Reviewing a cable...sure, right. The company was like "you should really review these cables, they really are different, honest." Well, they are cool, but the reason why I mention them here is that for some reason, they just don't want to kink. They kind of act like al dente spaghetti. If they're mixed in with a bunch of cables all tangled on the floor, I just pull them out and they don't snag. Weird. I asked Planet Waves about this, and they mumbled something about the center conductor being 22 gauge wire and the insulating jacket :idk:

 

Of course, nudity such as the above would have allowed for more scientific testing, but I did the best I could under the circumstances.

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Yeah - when you think about how exact a configuration an unknotted coil of tubular material has to be in order to qualify as un-knotted...the natural state is a tangle....firefighters know all about this....gravity alone slides one coil partially down a level or three, then a little jostling and five other coils get partially out of place, then you of course you TUG on it even though you know that just makes it worse every time, but you tug on it anyway....

 

nat whilk ii

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When I take my PA out, I put my cables are in ziplock freezer bags then into a large plastic tote. The bag holds the coiled cable together and eliminates the need for knots or ties.

 

It is easy to search through to tote without getting any tangles and I can see the connectors through the bag.

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When I take my PA out, I put my cables are in ziplock freezer bags then into a large plastic tote. The bag holds the coiled cable together and eliminates the need for knots or ties.


It is easy to search through to tote without getting any tangles and I can see the connectors through the bag.

 

 

mind = blown :eek:

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Just take the time to wrap your cables. I learned this at the IT Department I work for. We use inexpensive wire or velcro wraps to do this to ever cable that goes into a bin. Now we NEVER have the headache of cables getting jumbled. Its worth the time to wrap the cable with a piece of wire than to set there and curse while you detangle everything. I used to get so mad at home boxes of cable. I would violently take one end of a cable and start yanking the whole mess up and down which probably led to damaged cables.

 

I like the idea of the ziplock bags and you could label them, but taking them out and putting them back into bags a bunch of time would be exhausting to me. Because for some reason unless they have the zipper kind that goes across (expensive) I can never seem to get those things to seal on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd try.

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Just take the time to wrap your cables. I learned this at the IT Department I work for. We use inexpensive wire or velcro wraps to do this to ever cable that goes into a bin. Now we NEVER have the headache of cables getting jumbled. Its worth the time to wrap the cable with a piece of wire than to set there and curse while you detangle everything. I used to get so mad at home boxes of cable. I would violently take one end of a cable and start yanking the whole mess up and down which probably led to damaged cables.

 

I like the idea of the ziplock bags and you could label them, but taking them out and putting them back into bags a bunch of time would be exhausting to me. Because for some reason unless they have the zipper kind that goes across (expensive) I can never seem to get those things to seal on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd try.

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