the.com/zip tie
the cheapest one-way relationship plastic ever invented — it only knows how to tighten.
means A thin, ratcheting plastic strap with a self-locking head that pulls tight to bundle, fasten, or secure things, and won't loosen again without being cut.
from A 20th-century industrial invention: the self-locking nylon strap was patented in the late 1950s by an electrical company under the name 'Ty-Rap,' designed to bundle aircraft wiring without the tedium of waxed lacing cord. The everyday name 'zip tie' is descriptive — 'tie' for what it does, 'zip' echoing the quick zzzip sound of the toothed strap ratcheting through its locking pawl, the same onomatopoeic 'zip' that gave us the zipper. 'Cable tie' remains the more formal term, betraying its wire-wrangling birthplace.
- Inventor
- Created in 1958 to bundle aircraft wiring
- One direction
- Internal ratchet teeth permit zero loosening
- Brute strength
- Heavy-duty versions hold over 100 pounds
- Space proof
- NASA uses them in spacecraft assembly
- Police adoption
- Disposable handcuffs since the 1960s
hellerman tyton ty-loa — major manufacturer since 1935, produces millions of cable ties annually