Do Octopi and Cars Have Anything in Common?
In addition to the amazingly weird marine animals, we also call some of the large-scale electronic wire harnesses that we build octopi. When we found out that October 8th is Octopus Day we just had to write something that highlighted both of them and paid homage to their name. This article gives you a chance to learn more about
automotive wire harnesses
marine octopi
Automotive Wire Harnesses
One of the more fun, ongoing projects we have is building aftermarket, main engine harnesses for a long standing performance line of American sports cars. These octopi or wire harnesses are designed for use in the demanding environment of very high-performance cars. They can be used to rebuild power trains or switch to a different engine platform. These harnesses are also used to build the very popular and very awesome resto-mods which merge classic body styles with new, extraordinarily-powerful engines and the power trains of modern-day cars.
No matter what we may think of the wear and tear of potholes or daily commuting; cars built for the track operate under even more demanding and extreme conditions. The crashes, high heat, and vibrations a high-performance sports car endures will damage the insulation and connectors on a car’s main wire harness. The most basic automotive harnesses have 8-12 circuits that control many sub-systems of a car's suite of electronics; including electrical power, sensor data, and display information. These subsystems may work in conjunction with the engine and powertrain or be specific to the dashboard and display etc. Cars today, however, have harnesses with 60-100 circuits and miles of wire used throughout the matrix of electronic connections required to bring a car up to today’s technological standards.
Large Scale Wire Harnesses
When a wire harness has more than 8 or 10 wires we often begin calling them an octopus. The engine harnesses we built to use as replacements in sports cars were a bit more complicated, e.g. they were large octopi. These harnesses are 10 feet long and contain:
75 different wires in with a variety of specifications
Multiple ultra-sonically spliced wire leads
25 sets of connectors to join specific functions together
Specialized multi-conductor cables
Many different layers of protection such as water-proof seals, high-quality heat shrink tubing to protected welded splices, protective “loom”, and industrial grade tape
Marine Octopi (Octopoda)
World Octopus Day, October 8th celebrates these amazing creatures. Octopi are a member of the cephalopod family, there are over 300 species of Octopi. They predate dinosaurs; fossil specimens have been found that are over 300 million years old. The octopus is an amazing animal and is considered to be one of the most intelligent creatures in the world. They can have up to 9 brains.
Octopi come in all shapes, sizes and colors. The tiny blue-ringed octopus is just 5-8 inches long, but has a venomous bite that makes it one of the most-deadly marine animals. By comparison, the Giant Pacific Octopus weighs about 33lbs and their arms can span 14 feet. The largest known specimen of the Giant Pacific weighed 600lbs and was 30 in length. Octopi live both in the very shallow waters and the depths of the ocean. A ghostly image of an octopus was taken by NOAA’a Okeanos Explorer 2.6 miles below the ocean’s surface!
Contact us Today
It’s pretty hard to get a custom octopus from the sea, but at DECA we would love to talk with you about building the large-scale wire harnesses for your next project. Contact us today:
Call 419-884-0071
Use our online quote form.