Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with wires

Fortunately, I don't work for the bomb squad.

Inspector.Gadget — Tue, 12 May 2009 21:19:06 -0800

I need to do some wire splicing on a set of desktop speakers and I'd like some suggestions for improvement. Hey Ask, thanks in advance. I have a run-of-the-mill 2.1 Logitech computer speaker set-up. A quarter-inch jack lead to a wired remote, which leads to a subwoofer, which connects to two smaller speakers. The male 1/4 inch jack that would ordinarily connect to the line out of my laptop's sound card has suffered some wear and/or corrosion. Consequently, rotating the jack allows me to hear audio out of at most one external speaker at a time. Attempts to clean the jack with pencil erasers and rubbing alcohol (separately) have revealed that the problem is at least partly damageds surfaces and failed to remedy it. The internal line-out connection (female) on the sound card is working fine as tested with two sets of headphones.

Here's my plan to fix the jack problem:
1. Buy any cheap device or cable with a 1/4 inch male jack, preferably at a flexible right angle to the cable. Buy a small roll of electrical tape.
2. Cut off the existing jack and remove the molding (but not the inner layer of insulation) around about an inch of the cable that used to connect the jack and the wired remote.
3. Remove the insulation from a small section of the wire and prepare the new cable in a like manner: leave the jack at one end connected to a ~6" piece of the cable it was attached to with the other end stripped.
4. Connect the two stripped sections by twisting, and cover up just past the stripped section of each old cable with tightly wrapped electrical tape.

If I happen to find a wire cap small enough to accomodate the two wires, I'll use that in addition to the electrical tape.

How can I improve on this procedure? Am I doing anything stupid? Any blindingly obvious improvements I'm missing?

Thanks.

Help me organize my gadgets.

jacobian — Mon, 15 Jan 2007 10:20:24 -0800

Like any self-respecting geek, I've got a bunch of cool toys I carry around. Each of those toys, unfortunately, comes with a bunch of wires -- chargers, adapters, connectors... Help me keep them organized! I'm looking for some sort of carrying case that I can stuff all my gadgets and their wires into. Right now I just drop stuff into my backpack, but it all falls to the bottom. This sucks because I have to root around to find what I'm looking for, and it doubly sucks because it puts all the weight at the bottom of the pack.

So I'm looking for some sort of zippered container, roughly paper-sized (so it'll fit nicely in my backpack), with a whole bunch of pouches for gadgets and/or elastic/velcro for cables. Something like a Trapper Keeper for gadgets, or one of those "business organizers" with a bunch of extra pockets.

I'm totally game for a DIY solution involving modifying something that's not quite there, but I'd really prefer just to plunk down some cash for the perfect thing.

Wires stapled to walls. Is this legal?

23skidoo — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 13:36:12 -0800

My girlfriend's landlord ran a wire from her fusebox to a new water heater stored in her bedroom closet. He punched holes in the hallway, bathroom, and closet, and stapled the wire to the wall. What recourse does she have? She lives in an apartment, and since she moved in there has been a water heater in her bedroom closet. Hers is the only apartment in the complex that has its own water heater, which was put in because of a request made by a previous tenant.

About 3 weeks ago, they replaced the water heater, instead of doing what she asked for, which was to be put back on the main water heater that the rest of the complex uses. There is currently a thick-ass orange wire that comes out of the wall located by the fusebox outside the bathroom. The wire then goes into the bathroom (via a small hole that looks like it was punched by a screwdriver), runs along the wall of the bathroom (at about a foot down from the ceiling), goes through another punched hole into the bedroom closet, and then gets plugged into the water heater.

It is horribly unsightly. I get upset every time I see it. My girlfriend found some stuff in the National Electric Code that suggests that electrical wires stapled to bathroom walls may not be kosher. The questions are:

1) Is the hackjob that was done legal, or illegal? I live in Austin, TX.

2) If illegal, what does she have to do in order to force the people to hide the wires? She originally asked them to hide them in conduits or run the wire through the ceiling, and she was told that the wires would only be painted and left where they were. If there is some law on her side, what should she be doing? Who should she be contacting to get them to comply?

How to stop my cats chewing wires?

joshers13 — Sun, 17 Dec 2006 10:51:34 -0800

How do I keep my two cats from chewing through every wire less than an eighth of an inch in diameter? They eat every pair of headphones that I buy, no matter how well I keep them hidden or protected. Please help!

Installing cable in rooms without cable ports

XQUZYPHYR — Mon, 30 Oct 2006 09:34:04 -0800

Can I add a cable outlet in my house without running more cable? I'm moving to a new house, and Comcast cable will be installed in the living room, where there is already an outlet. I and some other roomates want cable in our rooms as well, but per the landlord we've just been told we are not allow to physically damage the walls/ceilings... in other words, we can't have new outlets physically put in any other rooms. In addition, because the house is already wired for cable, the landlord vetoes physical installation of any alternative, i.e. a satellite dish.

The most primitive solution would of course be to run a lot- and I mean a lot- of cable from the base house line to the rooms, but that means cable across the walls, up the staircases, in and out of rooms, etc. I'm wondering if there's an alternative solution to that, like a wireless system or something that sends the signal through AC outlets (like those things that let you add an extra phone jack via your power outlet).

To answer some potential detail questions: this would be standard coaxial cable from Comcast. The living room line would be to a box and a cable modem but the split lines to the rooms only need to carry the analog cable signal. No, I'm not violating any laws; Comcast confirms you can split the analog line to multiple rooms. No, I'm not asking how to steal cable; we are paying for service.

Is this dream of additional outlets possible, or are the only two choices cable running everywhere or begging the landlord to let us drill? In short, how can I get cable in multiple rooms and floors without physically damaging any part of my new house?

Placement of spark plug wires

jazzkat11 — Fri, 13 Oct 2006 16:00:00 -0800

Placement of spark plug wires.. I just changed my plugs and wires and in the midst of pure automotive geniusdom, didn't mark which wires connected to which coil pack.

Does it matter?

Help me build a relay & timer electronics project please.

odinsdream — Sun, 14 May 2006 16:15:24 -0800

I'd like to trigger a relay that momentarily closes a switch based on the voltage of another wire. Maybe. I think. Please help me with this basic (I hope) electronics project. Volkswagens with a hatchback have a "safety" feature that requires the flip of a switch in the driver's door before the latch on the hatch will function. The doors must also be unlocked.

I'd like to automate this process by tapping in to the wire that signals whether the Unlock button on the remote has been pressed. When this wire signals that I've pressed the button, I'd like a relay to close the hatch switch momentarily. So, this would be the same thing as me physically unlocking the car, opening the door, and pulling the little switch.

It might be necessary to delay the relay with some kind of timer - thus the switch would be thrown a few seconds after the unlock button gets pressed.

I have this controller, which already listens to the Unlock wire to accomplish its function. I have access to +12V, if that's necessary.

How do I go about building such a device?

How do I keep headphone wires from fraying at the plug?

muckster — Sat, 04 Mar 2006 13:23:19 -0800

How do I keep headphone wires from fraying at the plug? Almost every set of headphones I've ever used with portable players ended up dying because the wires would come out at the jack. Now, I just got a pretty fancy pair of earbuds, and I'd like them to avoid that same fate. Somebody once recommended wrapping the end in electrical tape--any other advice on how to keep the wires from breaking?

How to dispose of useless wires?

danblaker — Wed, 14 Dec 2005 06:45:58 -0800

Cleaning out the basement... What do I do with all these useless wires? Over the years, I've accumulated a few cardboard boxes worth of sundry wires, cables and power supplies. Many of these are useless without another (missing) piece of hardware, so they can't go to Goodwill. Is there any way to keep them out of a landfill?

god damn it

trinarian — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 18:42:42 -0800

Why is the audio on my computer oscillating at some weird and vagrant frequency? I started getting only one channel on my sound system, so I went under and done fiddled with the wiring, and after thats audio plays at some weird rythm wherein it sounds really jumpy and cut up like a bad stream. It's gotten worse over the past 24 hours. Are the machines finally revolting?

Cable, Wires and Cords, Oh My!

dgeiser13 — Thu, 21 Jul 2005 18:41:54 -0800

What do you do with the assortment of cabling and other electronic doodaddery (especially that not currently being used and not wanting to throw away!) that one tends to accumulate in the course of lifetime when you have a love of almost all things electronic? My wife and I just moved from an apartment to our first house (yay us!) and the move confirmed my nagging suspicion that over the last 20 years of apartment living and roommate having I've collected a whole lot of cables, wires and cords (boo me!). I don't mind so much the ones that I regularly or continously use for my TV, DVR, Videogames, Stereo, Computer, Digital Camera, etc. but rather the ones that are NOT needed for anything at this particular moment but that I might need somewhere down the line be it next week, next month or next year.

I've got speaker wire, power cords, power supplies, coaxial cable, av cable, usb cable, cat5, power strips, phone cords, phone adapters, adapters for european quipment (both power and av), sets of computer speakers, dsl adapters and on and on. It seems like those all have a great similarity and could be stored in a somewhat organized fashion but I always end up getting annoyed, loosely sorting them, throwing them in some unwieldy cardboard boxes and hiding them away somewhere...until I need something akin the next time and either haul them out or just buy new.

I don't really want to throw them away as it seems like a waste.

I'm looking for an elegant solution be it something I may buy in a store or online or perhaps build or even a mindset or way of looking at and dealing with these necessary evils. My ultimate solution would allow me to easily access the cabling, identify what I have (so I don't keep buying more of something I don't need), note the length of each piece, and would allow me to store or organize it compactly so I can fit more than just 3 coils of co-ax in a box that could hold 10 times more in volume.

Whatever the method I'm sure a non-ugly solution would also win me points with my wife as well.

I'm Trying to hook up my radio on my stereo, but I have 4 wire holes for only 2 wires. What gives?

jmd82 — Thu, 15 Apr 2004 14:15:35 -0800

I'm Trying to hook up my radio on my stereo, but I have 4 wire holes for only 2 wires. What gives? (pretty illustration inside)
The little boxes are where the wires can go in. I am mainly interested in FM, specifically frequencies below 90MHz. I get a signal if I put the antenna's two wires in any combination of the bottom three slots. Is one combination better than the other and what what do the different combinations do for reception?