Weekly 2 (actually 3)

Aspen Kimlicko (Ollie)

I was inspired by the way I use carabiners, which is to clip things on to zippers, belt loops, belts, over a waistband, and basically on any loop that exists on my belongings. I wanted to create a carabiner clip that attaced to a probe, so that it could be hooked around anything metal to show continuity. In partnership with the hook, I wanted to also use a key ring. I like the idea of having a female/male connector oneither end of hte probe, for a variety of uses.

Attaching the exposed wire was easy, bacause it could be wrapped around the metal ring. The shrink tubing was the harder part. While the shape of the carabiner worked great, the round shape of the key ring caused problems. I ended up habing to tape around the shrink tubing so that it would stay on. I also burned the paracord trying to shrink the huge size down to the width of the paracord, and had to add a second piece of shrink tube over the other one. Since the tube isn't sticky, the two pieces slid around and didn't stay where I wanted them. Despite this, the connection is still strong, because the wire was both wraped around the ring and placed under one level of the ring. When using it as a probe, the needle part of the probe can be slipped between layers of the ring.

Making th regular connectors:

I found that tighter shrink tubing made tighter, stronger connections that looser tubing. I also found that the greater surface area that the wire took up, the better the connection was, so I wrapped and folded it over itself. This gave more area to stick against the conductive tape.

My final connectors:

I think the carabiner clip worked great. It's a strong connection and the shrink tubing went over it easily, creating a strong clip. I could see this being used in a tensioned kind of textile where the clip could easily be attached around a loop and pulled to establish a connection. The key ring wasn't as successful, but I can still see that it could be useful in a textile. It could be woven into a textile, or some kind of thread could be wrapped around the ring. I think it is interesting that I could make several of these ring/hook connectors and extend the line as long as I want by clipping them into each other.

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