Coiling a cable....

[mac.calder]

Why? You can easily fold a figure8-ed cable in half and tape at the top if you want to peg them. We used to do that all the time with 10-15m socca, as you would rip the tape, fold out on the ground where you're plugging in, then run out, leaving you with any excess nicely fig8ed in dimmer land.

 

Because, thats how we do it.

 

You have the target of my question confused. Why do you think that there will be a lot of people "Very annoyed" - just because HIS method is different from YOUR method - or the method of the company you work for does not make his method any less correct - nor yours.

 

Some of the largest companies in the world do certain tasks in extremely stupid ways - so "the biggest company" in no way indicates that the way they do things is the best. After all, I worked for the largest corporate AV company in the Southern Hemisphere - the way they did things was often bordering on obscene!

[Bobbsy]

After all, I worked for the largest corporate AV company in the Southern Hemisphere - the way they did things was often bordering on obscene!

 

Yeah, I always thought insisting on the "over and under" being done naked was a bit much! :)

 

More seriously, people have said they don't like a figure of 8 or the "over and under" method because they don't look as tidy. I think they are missing the point. Cable coiling is not a beauty contest. As said before, the two goals should be avoiding damage to the cores that would be caused by kinking and/or twisting the cable and ease of handling when using the cable again. Any time you use a straight coil (other than on a drum obviously) the cable has to be "paid out" when used to avoid damaging and unsightly kinks. This takes time and, in a professional setting time is money. It's far better to be able to grab an end a go knowing the cable will neatly "pay itself out" or (with XLRs) simply be able to hold and end and toss a cable knowing it will extend cleanly.

 

As mac.calder says, big companies often develop in-house standards but that doesn't make them an industry standard--it doesn't even always mean they're right.

 

A final thought: the "over and under" method is effectively doing a figure of 8 already bent in half.

 

Bob

[heinz57]

I just coil it in a loop like you should. To straighten it up I kind of toss the cable along the floor (still keeping hold of one end) and coil it up.

 

As long as it's not the elbow method its all good as far as I'm concerned...Elbow wrecks cables!!!

 

Paint kind of wrecks them aswell. At college we had a lighting cable which at some point had been painted over. the cable can't have been straight at the time and the paint went all hard. Now this cable is virtualy impossible to coil. I avoided using this cable at all costs and when it was used I got someone else to coil it.

 

It was paint was white paint aswell. So it isnt like it couldnt be seen. White paint on a black cable.

[JDP]

Mac, it gets people annoyed, because in MOST UK rental/production companies thats how it works. We do our cables like that. Simple as. It gets people annoyed when on a job someone can't coil the cable the way it needs to be done, and has to be re-coiled in the warehouse - they may as well not bother in the first place.

[berry120]

Paint kind of wrecks them aswell. At college we had a lighting cable which at some point had been painted over. the cable can't have been straight at the time and the paint went all hard. Now this cable is virtualy impossible to coil. I avoided using this cable at all costs and when it was used I got someone else to coil it.

 

It was paint was white paint aswell. So it isnt like it couldnt be seen. White paint on a black cable.

 

Doesn't sound nice. To be honest, I'd either find a place for it where it's hardly ever going to be moved and can't be seen, or if it's just a bog standard cable, strip it of it's connectors and bin it. Unless there's some brilliant method of getting paint off of cables...

 

People talking of the elbow method have got me thinking of the worst cable coiling I've ever seen. I think the one I saw had to be someone I saw using the elbow method, then dropping half the cable, not bothering to re-do it, bunching the whole lot up and tying a big knot in the middle because he couldn't find any tape. The knot didn't even go through the whole cable though, just the bit he hadn't dropped on the floor... Said person was promptly assigned to another task.

 

The end result looked like a combination of cable vandalism and abstract art!

[6th Order]

... Any time you use a straight coil (other than on a drum obviously) the cable has to be "paid out" when used to avoid damaging and unsightly kinks. This takes time and, in a professional setting time is money...

Bob

 

For me, I'd rather 'pay out' a cable, run it neatly (and still pretty quickly) leaving a neater result, which is then easier to chase/fault find if necessary. I think it's worth spending a small amount of time when laying out cables to make it easier to find and slove any problems. If you simply pull out a cable, you still have to go back and straighten it.

 

A real 'each to their own' topic!

[daifuse]

Working as a Y-I-T for P.O.Telephones in my youth, overhead wires between poles were of a copper alloy, semi-tempered and very 'springy'. To get the wire to lay straight when uncoiled we were taught to hold the wire coil in one hand and take off 5 turns with the other. Then swap hands and take off 5 turns with the other. This eliminated any kinks.

 

I now do the same if coiling or uncoiling wires on or off drums if it's not possible to put the drum on a bar of some sort.

 

(Hope I'm not teaching my dear old granny to suck eggs!)

 

Incidentally - any other old Yiti's out there?

[mac.calder]

Mac, it gets people annoyed, because in MOST UK rental/production companies thats how it works. We do our cables like that. Simple as. It gets people annoyed when on a job someone can't coil the cable the way it needs to be done, and has to be re-coiled in the warehouse - they may as well not bother in the first place.

 

I feel like I am hitting my head against a brick wall.. Your way is not always right, you cannot generalize about "Most" UK rental places unless you have copious amounts of experience with most of the companies in the UK, and you cannot make generalisations on behalf of the rest of the blackshirts. Yes, certain practices are not the most common - and some organisations are very strict on how certain procedures need to occur, that is their right, but to tell someone who's practice is no less correct than yours, but who's method is different to yours that they are wrong is just plain arrogant.

 

Please...

[Piers Shepperd]

It gets people annoyed when on a job someone can't coil the cable the way it needs to be done, and has to be re-coiled in the warehouse

 

I used to work at a very small lighting company in London, and the majority of cables (both Multicore and Ceeform) were recoiled by default when they came back into the warehouse.

Multicore and Ceeform cables were recoiled on an automated winder machine which ensured all cables came out of the box with roughly the same diameter. They were then taped in two places with orange PVC tape. They were then tested, before being put back on the cable racks.

TRS cables would be recoiled either by hand, or by machine depending on length, or if they looked neat enough left as they were.

Cloth tape was then used to keep them together (this signified that they had been tested and was easier then PVC to snap). I think in recent years this has also been replaced with orange PVC tape.

 

The reason for all of this recoiling was to ensure that multicores and TRS could be run out quickly when required, hung evenly on the racks when stored and allowed for an easy visual method to confirm that the cable had been tested and could go out on a job.

 

Heavy mains would be left coiled in boxes as it came back from jobs, but would be retested and inspected.

 

Clearly (as the renowned touring practitioner JDP has already said elsewhere) some multi runs were kept together as tripes depending on if a tour was going out again for another leg. Tripes coming in off large one off events were broken back down into their seperate multicores.

 

Bored now,

 

Piers

[JDP]

Out of interest Piers, did you have any issues with the cable winder in terms of how it 'treats' the cables? Wondering as recently we had some new cables made, which were wound on a winder. The cables have done nothing but twist and end up nasty - so wondered if you had the same issues?

Sorry off topic.

 

Mac, for what its worth, over my period in the industry I have been to a lot of warehouses in the UK, usually picking up sub-hires or delivering kit, meeting LDs, Project Managers etc. This has ALWAYS been the way it is on the shelves in the UK companies, I am not going to write a list, but this includes companies of all sizes in all areas of the UK. So, I think my only arrogance here, is that I haven't bothered to take note of how its done in Australia, US, Europe etc...

 

A few companies, including us do use a stillages, but we have loose (figure of 8'd in) Powerlock, but for Socapex/heavy mains CEE-form, we still coil in the usual format and stick in the stillages.

 

Ahh I am over this.

[Yorkie]

I'm used to coiling in the over-under fashion as shown in the video, albeit without the XLR's mated. I advocate that proper coiling of cables is the first thing that volunteers working in the business should learn, otherwise they tend just to get in the way come packdown. It also means that they become familiar with every sort of cable, rather than, say understanding a DJ mixer but not knowing what to connect it up with (that's another rant...)

 

I don't have experience with very large cables, but I would personally coil the following on the floor as a figure of eight: Soca over 10m, NL8 over 20m, 16/1 over 50m, 32/1 over 20m, 16/3 over 10m, Multis over 20way by 20m. I worked somewhere that kept all the soca in one pile and having the shorter ones coiled differently saved a bit of time when identifying. I have a personal preference of double taping things like 20m TRS and 15m NL8 (less mess when pulling cables out of a pile or trunk) although it drives some of my colleagues crackers.

 

I briefly encountered a group of fellows recently who were 'coiling' 6m mic cables by folding them in half three times and then tying them in a knot. Then the 'brainy one' would put the connectors together before they threw them in a box. If my cables arrived back like that I'd be cross. (I have been known to use that coiling method with 13A 2m 4ways though)

[Light Console]

The OB team at hospital radio are told to wrap the cable around their arm, and take the resulting loop, squish it down, and place an elastic band on either end. This is then stored in two holdalls. This saves space and time, (not quite so when setting up, but still) allows for a easier load in/out as some venues have lots of stairs, and any skill base can help. It pains me to do it, but this system works for us, and every cable is checked before the OB starts, and they do still lie flat.

 

When I work for a friend of mine, we take the highest number out of the stage box, as it was last in, and coil correctly from there. In that way, the chances of coiling the same cable as someone else is nill. At the end, a light knot is tied with the cable. This is quicker than tape.

 

If I am running a gig, and people want to "help" I either suggest that they have a drink and come back later to help me move the boxes into the van, or provide a large bin for them to chuck cables into without any coiling. In that way, it can be sorted at home without any damage to cables being done.

 

I did once try the over-under method, and ended up in knot city the next time I used the cable. However, it is very handy to use on a cable which is too long, but both ends are fixed, which I had to do once on an install that needed to run there and then, but in 6 months they were going to move some of the kit during a refit, and needed some slack on the cables.

[the kid]

People say about worst cable methods, I'm happy so long as the kinks are out and they are neat and clean. Someone at work INSISTS on halving the cable halving again (so 4 lines 2 loops 1 end. 1 loop and connectors the other) and then tying a nice big knot in the middle. This method I use for micro disposable cables like minijack>minijack but other than that NEVER.

[Bobbsy]

The OB team at hospital radio are told to wrap the cable around their arm, and take the resulting loop, squish it down, and place an elastic band on either end.

 

I've probably done more TV OBs than you've had hot dinners (I hate to admit, but my first ever time getting paid for a couple hours of cable bashing was only a few weeks off 40 years ago) and I have to say that anyone treating cables like this at ANY place I've worked would have a very short career. With only a few minutes practice, you can learn to do the over/under technique as fast or faster than going around your arm.

 

As for the over/under technique knotting, I hat to say it but you must have done it wrong. The whole point of the method is that the cable DOESN'T knot when you go to use it again. Done properly you should be able to either grab one end and walk away with it paying itself out cleanly or hold and end and chuck the rest away from you, again paying out cleanly.

 

Bob

[Light Console]

As I say, I hate doing the cables around my arms, but they wont do it any other way!

 

As to over/under, I probably did get it wrong! I'll have another go next time I am coiling cables. Sadly, now that it is the school holidays, I have 3,500 items to PAT. Not going near a mic cable till September!