this post was submitted on 31 May 2025
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Mildly Interesting

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Serious question.

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[–] CocaineShrimp@lemm.ee 58 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Pro tip: you can use the plastic tabs from bread bags as little wire tags

[–] over_clox@lemmy.world 25 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Additional Pro Tip: Colored Zip Ties

Good tip though πŸ‘

[–] Psythik@lemm.ee 5 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Zip ties are too small to write on.

[–] Mongostein@lemmy.ca 1 points 8 hours ago

Coloured electrical tape works. Make little flags.

[–] Aussiemandeus@aussie.zone 4 points 1 day ago

Liebherr have little tags you print on that are secured in a plastic sleeve be a zip tie for cable identification

[–] IphtashuFitz@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I do lighting design in small theaters & have a fair amount of my own gear. I have a ton of 3-pin, 4-pin, and 5-pin XLR cables, and also some adapters that convert between 3&5 pin. I use colored zip ties on the ends of each cable to not only tell me what type of cable it is but to distinguish my cables from the theaters cables.

[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I've worked in some big data centers. The network wiring, thank god, is labeled on each end with a unique number. They come from the supplier like that, and are tracked for decom just like anything else.

Otherwise, 20cm diameter bundles, yeah.

[–] over_clox@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago

Sometimes writing isn't necessary, just gotta distinguish between two different wire harnesses.

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 33 points 2 days ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

That's nothing!

thailand cable salad

Sorry for the stock imagery; I've seen even more extreme salad but can't find it now.

[–] Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world 40 points 2 days ago (1 children)
[–] Ebby@lemmy.ssba.com 22 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Fun fact: A skilled linesman can use their tongue to tell the difference between 9V DC and 115kV AC.

The more you know*

[–] mojofrododojo@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

115kV AC.

well, they can, once....

You can tell it's 14.4kV by the linemans muscle spasms and sudden loss of consciousness. If he bursts into flames or is immediately vaporized, that's the 115kV.

Although, the way you can tell if the lineman really knows what he's doing is if he gets someone from the right-of-way crew to do the tongue test for him.

[–] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 4 points 2 days ago

A great tip for those who need a little cooling off after the end of a hot day; who would have thought to include AC with power lines! What will they think of next?

[–] teft@lemmy.world 41 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

Fluke makes a bunch of tone generators and circuit finders that you can use to figure out which line you need to work on. I assume linesmen have something similar for their more robust needs.

[–] bobs_monkey@lemm.ee 20 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Power linemen have phasing sticks to determine which phase is which.

Datacom wires are, to start, much lower on the pole than power cables, and have markings on the cable jacket to determine what the cable actually is (fiber, coax, tel, etc). Beyond that, there is usually some tagging at each service point.

[–] hera@feddit.uk 22 points 2 days ago

When we had our broadband installed the guy doing it took way too long and got very frustrated and made a mess of it, but it worked. Two days later it stopped working.

When the fault engineer came and fixed it, turned out the original engineer had connected us to the wrong cable, so when another engineer came to set up our neighbour's Internet, they disconnected ours.

[–] needanke@feddit.org 14 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Cut it and wait for someone to complain.

[–] em2@lemmy.ml 3 points 2 days ago

Ah, the 'ol reliable Scream Test.

[–] vinnymac@lemmy.world 6 points 2 days ago

If you think this is bad you should visit Mexico City. I don’t know who has the worst wiring in the world, but it’s like your photo, except 10x more tangled and everywhere you look you will find wires literally dangling in front of you while you walk down a street or cross walk. Who knows which ones are live.

[–] over_clox@lemmy.world 10 points 2 days ago (1 children)

If you piss on it and smoke comes out, the line is live, obviously.

[–] funkajunk@lemm.ee 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Does the smoke come out of your dick, or do you not know how conductivity works?

[–] over_clox@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

Yes, the line is live, but the test unit only functions once..

Disclaimer: I've never used my test probe in such a way.

Didn't the Mythbusters do the peeing on the third rail thing? Seems similar enough.

[–] Teddy@programming.dev 8 points 2 days ago
[–] treadful@lemmy.zip 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I love weird style transformers.

[–] Maiq@lemy.lol 2 points 2 days ago

More than meets the eye?

[–] huppakee@lemm.ee 3 points 2 days ago

You can embed an image by writing ![optional alt text](img url), make sure the url actually leads to the image and end with something like .jpg .png or .webp