On Sun, 20 Feb 2011 16:57:18 -0000, Gareth Magennis wrote:

You need the double twisting method on any cable longer than a couple of
metres or so.

Agreed.

This is how the noise boys do it. They wrap a lot of cables, some of
them 100's of metres of multicore which is a damn sight stiffer than B&W
mains cable.

I doubt that you mean that literally for hand coiling, it would be
too damn heavy! 50m of heavy star quad is too much and my hand isn't
big enough even with each loop taking 5' of cable... Multicore over
about 20m is figure of eighted on the ground or more likely wound
onto a drum.

But certainly coiling 30m + of mic cable is not a problem, nor is the
uncoiling *provided* that the twist you put in for each turn of the
coil in in opposite directions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqbYy...eature=related

That is first of my saved selection of "how to coil a cable" YouTube
vids:

Though he says "no knots", if you take one of the free ends through
the center you may well end up with a series of knots but don't
panic! They are all tied in the same direction, just take an end
thread it back through the all the knots and pull they will magically
disappear.

There are two ways of doing the "under" bit of the reverse twist
loop, this is the second but looks really cack handed to me (I use
the first method).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLwwB29uQRg

This is novel, not tried it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaEv9wm6gy0

--
Cheers
A noise boy.