[Augerhandle]

I've always searched for a decent way to mark speaker cables. In the past, I have used everything from masking tape tags to knots in the wire. What do you use?

Yes, many AV receivers come with stick-on tags for this purpose, but I found them troublesome whenever I wanted to swap out new wires or when re-purposing longer and shorter wires after rearranging the room. I also wanted something that adhered to the color coding of the surround channels while still being changeable and reusable.

Front Right: Red
Front Left: White
Center Channel: Green
Side Surround Left: Blue
Side Surround Right: Gray
Back Surround Left: Brown
Back Surround Right: Tan
Sub-woofers: Purple

Colored heat shrink seemed a good choice, but it is too permanent and becomes expensive, especially when trying to find all of the colors needed. I looked into several options, from those colored gel pencil grips the kids use, to special-order silicone bands. It was always the same two issues. Either not all the colors were available, or it just wasn't cost effective. I just recently hit on using colored o-rings, and was able to source them cheaply enough. I'm liking it.

Samples

That's 16 AWG Belden speaker cable on the left, and 14 AWG zip cable on the right (snug on the 14 AWG, just tight enough on the 16 AWG)

Close-up of 16 AWG and 14 AWG

16 AWG zip cord (didn't seem tight enough)

Though they fit nicely over the 14 AWG and larger wire, I decided to add another ring to the 16 AWG Belden...

...and two to the 16 AWG zip cord to tighten them up



It appears these will work with everything from small gauge speaker wire to 12/2 zip cord (not shown), and can be used to mark individual banana plugs as well. They will also slide over 3/8" flex sleeve when I upgrade my front cables.

 

[toddman36]

Ive always made my own labels with masking tape and a sharpie!

 

[Otto Pylot]

Seems like an awful lot of work. I've just used little strips of colored masking tape in the past. You can get them in multiple colors or if you run out of colors just use two strips of one color and one strip of the same color for a different wire.

 

[Augerhandle]

Seems like an awful lot of work. I've just used little strips of colored masking tape in the past. You can get them in multiple colors or if you run out of colors just use two strips of one color and one strip of the same color for a different wire.

Not really any work at all. It took about the same amount of time as taping would (less time, if one counts writing on uncolored tape), and is cheaper than buying 7-8 rolls of different colored tape only to use just a couple inches of tape from each roll. There also is less ambiguity than using multiple strips of tape with less colors. All these issues were addressed in my original post.

...I found [tags] troublesome whenever I wanted to swap out new wires or when re-purposing longer and shorter wires after rearranging the room. I also wanted something that adhered to the color coding of the surround channels while still being changeable and reusable...It was always the same two issues. Either not all the colors were available, or it just wasn't cost effective...

 

[Augerhandle]

Ive always made my own labels with masking tape and a sharpie!

Me too! ...and I hated it. That's why I switched to O-rings.