Cable care, wrapping

[gdougherty]

<rant>
Okay, this is one area of my rig where I'm particularly OCD. If I see anyone improperly wrapping my cables, I gently excuse them from the task when I'm in a hurry, and attempt a training if I'm not. I regularly re-wrap poorly wrapped cables because in my experience, how they go into the case and live for a few days becomes how they want to remain for a while. If they're consistently wrapped poorly, you can destroy the shielding and make the cable useless for anything requiring phantom power.

Case in point, I just spent two hours applying a lot of TLC to a 100' snake for a municipal band I run sound for. It's been handled by many people of the years and most of them had no clue on proper cable wrapping. Even after securing one end of the snake and doing everything one person can to straighten out the cable; it has twists and the remnants of some particularly bad kinks. The kinks looked like someone took it and folded it over on itself at 90 degrees. Amazingly enough, the cable still worked less one bad channel when it was tested the other day. By contrast, my own identical snake works, looks and lays like it did when it was purchased about 8 years ago, less the obvious road wear. The difference? My snake and all other cables never get wrapped up except by what I know as backcoiling and many people know as the over/under technique.
</rant>
If you're not already familiar with this, do yourself, and your cables, a favor and learn how. Once you take the time to practice and master the technique, you'll use it on everything because it makes a huge difference in handling the cables during setup. Just make sure to secure the ends tightly so they can't loop through and create knots as the video below demonstrates. IMO, the occasional knotted cable is a small price to pay for having your cables lay flat and last longer.

Wikipedia entry discussing some of the why:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Over/under_cable_coiling

Video demonstration:
http://members.cox.net/mactop/

In the video above I prefer the roll towards, roll away method, over the thumbs together method for several reasons.
First, my hand never leaves the cable, allowing for a fast wrap. The method is nothing but sliding your hand down the cable rolling it between your fingers one way and then the other as you place the newly created loop in your other hand.
Second, with practice, the distance you move the wrapping hand from the holding hand becomes easy to physically memorize making it easy to produce consistent coils of any size.
Because of those reasons I've yet to see a thumbs together practitioner able to wrap cable as fast and neatly as I can with the finger rolling method. It does seem to take longer to master it, but the effort is well worth it.

[djohnson573]

Not sure it is the same, but here is what I do.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tis58Wvi168

[bgavin]

That is the same one I learned.
The proof is throwing the coil as shown in the video.
If it unwraps correctly, you had it correctly wrapped.

[gdougherty]

Not nearly as clear as Chris Babbie's demo I linked above, but that is the same result. If I get ambitious sometime I may make my own video demo showing the right way as I do it and why I do it that way .

[Scott Brochu]

Mine is the hose reel method XLR to XLR rotate the wheel repeat XLR etc...
Would like to learn the over under for instrument cables though.

[bgavin]

I've thought a lot about the hose reel method.
Make all XLR the same length, splice together, unroll from the spool as you need a cable.
Butt two together if you need a longer cable.

My last show was a big stage, and I found most of my 15' cables too short.
The snake box was front/center, but I still needed 20' for the mics and 30' for the instruments.

[Sydney]

the hose reel method.

A friend of mine has used this method successfully for many years now.
He made a box for the reel assembly.

[DaveK]

I've thought a lot about the hose reel method.

I tried it with a power cord reel from HD. I chained all the mic cables of the same length together and rolled. The problem was that the straight segment where the XLRs join is about 6" long and will not lay flat on the reel. It sticks out on each end and and puts a pretty sharp bend on the wire where it enters the strain relief. That made me uncomfortable enough to go back to hand coiling.

A reel with a big enough spool diameter would reduce the sharp bend, but take a lot more space in the transport box.

[novasak]

I use over/under method. I'm also OCD about my cables, and having others wrap them can cause me great headaches. I try to show friends the technique, but most just shrug and think I'm a geek for being so delicate about it. This message comes from people who use the "Bin" technique. Toss it into a bin, stuff it in there and slam the lid on. DONE!

[Scott Brochu]

I use over/under method. I'm also OCD about my cables, and having others wrap them can cause me great headaches. I try to show friends the technique, but most just shrug and think I'm a geek for being so delicate about it. This message comes from people who use the "Bin" technique. Toss it into a bin, stuff it in there and slam the lid on. DONE!

I understand your frustration. With my instrument cables they get a quick coil and tossed in the plastic tote and done.
I get a lot of looks from people that have even been in the biz a bit.
Looks from;
corner loading subs,
how high I place the mains,
and the hose reel method.

I tried it with a power cord reel from HD. I chained all the mic cables of the same length together and rolled. The problem was that the straight segment where the XLRs join is about 6" long and will not lay flat on the reel. It sticks out on each end and and puts a pretty sharp bend on the wire where it enters the strain relief. That made me uncomfortable enough to go back to hand coiling.

A reel with a big enough spool diameter would reduce the sharp bend, but take a lot more space in the transport box.

I know that it does this but for the inexpensive cords I use (cause people step all over them) it is an easy replacement and we always carry spares.

[Gregory East]

The featured guest got onto the host at the end of jam night the other day. He was winding up the mans cables all wrong. You should have seen the eyes glaze over as the tutorial got underway.

I think it comes down to whether or not you give a shit.

Girly hair ties with the bubbles on the end, never have stumped up the courage to go look for some, but they work great for tying up the coil.

[gdougherty]

Mine is the hose reel method XLR to XLR rotate the wheel repeat XLR etc...
Would like to learn the over under for instrument cables though.

I find it a major pain to use by comparison, though I work with a group that regularly loans out their PA and it works well to keep the cables organized. Personally, I have 10', 20', & 30' cables so that method doesn't work well for me.

[bgavin]

What about 3 spools?

My cables are tossed into a Rubbermaid tub, so organization is non-existent.
I'm on the hunt for a better method.

[gdougherty]

What about 3 spools?

My cables are tossed into a Rubbermaid tub, so organization is non-existent.
I'm on the hunt for a better method.

That would work, but I'm not a fan of spooling for many reasons, the major one is the strain on connectors as noted already. While it might be faster to click and wind them on for packing. I find it slower during setup to unspool, then collect the length. With my cables I release the velcro cable tie stand at the snake box and either toss the cable toward where I want to go or walk it neatly around everything. I also like to dress the cabling keeping it bundled together and out of areas where people might stand. It's a good cable training opportunity when helpers run the cable straight up to a mic stand right where the singer has to approach the mic. "Look, people standing or walking on cables destroys the cable over time. Keep it out of the way and I won't strangle you to death with it."
I have a larger box with enough bottom space to stack each length separately. They're all Neutrik ends with colored rings denoting length. Makes it very easy to tell someone to grab me a yellow 10' cable or two green 20' cables out of the box. Best thing I ever did with my cables other than ditching the colored velcro wraps which just confused people about cable coloration when I came up short on colors and had to put a green wrap on a 10' cable.
I should also note that I have people collect all cables next to the box and sometimes do a quick inventory before I toss them in.

[Sydney]

Maybe It a matter of finding a reel system that works.
My friends system ( similar to others I've seen ) has worked for many years, without strain issues and cable damage.
He was a line man and had extensive radar experience and it is similar to what they are use to dispense and recoil cabling on the job.
The spool is on axle on a race in a hinged box. Either unspool in box or remove spool.

EDIT: Some commercial approaches:
http://1staudiousa.com/cabler01.html
A DIY version would adapt and modify accordingly