KNOT CABLES
Brad Crane
Combining two materials through spinning immediately lead me to the idea of fluidity / flexibility in connections. I have been plagued in my life by a kludge of cables in every possible place. So what would happen if the knots did not matter?
Perhaps, the tangling even becomes a method of efficiency! In addition, the use of yarn as conductor introduces a new paradigm of bend radii, a common limiter in the dynamism of cables. If one could somehow construct a cable that was both shielded against others and able to short itself - a new efficient cable paradigm would be created.
PROCESS
In order to make connections through knotting, each cable will need to be virtually shielded against the others. The knot between two cables (or with itself) would create the connectivity. Spinning two yarns, one conductive and one not, produces a 50% surface area of conductivity.
I wondered what would happen if that mix was reduced to a level that the surface area of conductivity would be trivial. For this experiment I used a 1/5 conductive to insulated yarn mixture. The next question is would it be better to spin all six yarns into one at once, or advantageous to spin the insulators onto the conductor one at a time?
I posited that it would be desirable to spin a conductor and an insulator together for an initial twist. Then, taking that starter, spin another insulator into it, and repeat four more times. The twist was then set by submerging in warm water and hung to dry.
FUNCTION
Next the resulting cable was tested for its likelihood of shorting with an adjacent conductor. Then it was tested for its likelihood to short with itself, without intervention. <pictures of tests>
Test 1:
A conductor was laid and twisted around the knot yarn and the resistance between the two was measured. Interestingly the measurements were between 1.5kO in the worst case and 2MO in the best. This type of resistance could be used in advantageous ways to actually create circuit components (there was also an 11nF capacitance between the two conductors).
Test 2:
A conductor was tied directly to the knot yarn and the resistance between the two was measured. In this case the resistance was 200 Ohms, good enough for most electrical connections!
The combination of these results is a positive proof of concept for the ability of two yarns of this type to be run together as separate conductors, or for the conductors to be tied together instead of requiring soldering or sewing.
RESULTS
I think that by increasing the ply to around eight or ten the conductor would be completely insulated while maintaining a relatively small overall diameter. I imagine using this configuration for wearable-type cables like headphones, embedded devices in necklaces, or possibly even fabric based lower power circuits. I look forward to incorporating this technique into my future textile projects!
Diameter: 0.628mm2
Length: 2.0m
Ply: 6
\\
Twist: Z @ 25-30 twist/in
Resistance: 3kO/in