Spagetti and floor cord questions

[kestrel]

Amateur Club Armorer here.

* Are there specs on the spagetti and sources outside of the fencing suppliers?

* Anybody found any really good way to stress relief the floor cables to keep the wires from pulling out?

[edew]

There are plenty of other places (usually electronics supply stores) where you can get spaghetti wire coverings. Make sure you get one with a large enough inside diameter to comfortably fit the wire through. Hate to spend time threading that thing through, you know.

As for floor cords, they're usually the last thing to break among the chain of connections. I'd suggest, after purchasing a floor cord (especially if they're the cheapie chinese ones), re-do the connections at the plugs. Otherwise, just keep the cords slack and don't wound them too tight when you're storing them.

[neevel]

If you can't find a local electronics supply store for spaghetti tubing (I've never seen a Radio Shack stock it-- just heat shrink tubing-- but they might have it for order in the catalog), <a href="http://www.digi-key.com" target="_blank">Digi-Key</a> or <a href="http://www.mouser.com" target="_blank">Mouser</a> would have it (usually listed as PVC insulation tubing or the like). <a href="http://www.mcmaster.com" target="_blank">McMaster-Carr</a> would be another place to look.

As for floor cords, cover the stripped ends of the wire with a bit of solder (obviously not so much that it won't fit into the pin). This will give the contact screw something firmer to bite into when tightened. And beat people around the head and shoulders if they do stuff like pulling floor cords out by the cable rather than the plug body, or letting reel cables snap back from the center of the strip when unhooking.

-Dave

[fred]

Slightly OT:

Any reason I couldn't use ethernet-type CAT 5 for wiring up floor cords - given that I have some for free?

[DJ Apostrophe]

I believe cat 5 would be too brittle to handle the standard abuse of a floor cord... also the wires in cat 5 are of such small diameter that they would slip out rather easily from the pin... with some brands of cat 5 it is like pulling teeth to strip the insulation off the copper wire, so that may present yet another problem for you... my suggestion if you dont want to go with standard floor cord wire is 3 conductor microphone wire with dabs of solder on the end... its of a heavier quality than most of the floor cords and can handle being tied in knots and stretched and things... im not sure of the price on it is all.

[sallearmourer]

You can use cat 5 wire. What you do is double up the wire. take the blue white and white blue strip them back about a inch twisit them together and double them over and solder them. Do the same with O/W W/O and The G/W W/G works okay. ANd then you have a spare pair. Also you can get trailer wire from Auto part that is heavy enough to use as floor cords. Three strand in yellow green brown wire colors works well. That what I use for floor cords.


SalleArmourer

[fred]

Yes, DJ, after I saw your post, the thinness did strike me as a problem, but Tim's idea sounds like a good solution. Again, the fact that I have some available for nothing is the main motivation for considering the stuff, I'm sure there are better choices.

As for the durability of CAT5, from my experience in yanking great snarls of it around under cubicles, it does pretty well.

I'm curious as to why a manufacturer has never made a reel with an integral retractor for the floor cord as well, like on vacuum cleaners, it would be much more convenient for the many salles that have to share space and constantly set up and tear down strips.

[Stryder]

I thought of that fred, but what I decided is that in the end, you are talking about having two reels at each end of the strip. One for the reel, and one waiting around for the floor cords. It would work, but it was a little too much work in my opinion just to save me the time it takes to wind up a little cord. But then, I'm lazy.

Also, since you have to secure the floor cords to the floor, and again around the box for safety reasons, you wouldn't really save much time.

In the end we went with simply making up some really robust floor cords out of outdoor extension cords and home made connectors.
Set up and tear down go a lot faster when you can man handle your equipment without worrying. Also, a really good carrying case makes it less of a headache to pack up and go.