WO2015183743A1

WO2015183743A1 - Methods and devices for securing cords and related materials

Info

Publication number: WO2015183743A1
Application number: PCT/US2015/032217
Authority: WO
Inventors: Michael Lawrence PITTS
Original assignee: Blue Heron Partners Llc
Priority date: 2014-05-28
Filing date: 2015-05-22
Publication date: 2015-12-03

Abstract

Methods and devices for securing cords and related materials are disclosed in the present application. Cord-wrappers can include a bind-band, a wrap-band, and an anchor. A bind-band can act to attach the cord-wrapper to a cord, and can orient the same in a particular position relative to a cord to help bundle a cord. A wrap-band cars act to secure a bundled cord. The anchor can act to hold the wrap-band and bind-band together. As well, the anchor can embody a design element. Methods of using cord-wrappers to, for example, form bundled cords or secure a cord are also described herein.

Description

METHODS AND DEVICES FOR SECURING CORDS AND RELATED MATERIALS CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

[0001] This application claims priority to LIS, provisional patent application no. 61/997,331 filed on May 28, 2014, the entire contents of which is incorporated by reference.

FIELD OF THE APPLICATION

[0002] The technical field of the present application is directed generally toward methods for securing cords, cables, and other elongated, extended similar structures, and devices related to such methods.

BACKGROUND

[0003] Elongated cords are ubiquitous structures used in a variety of items such as ropes, string, cables, hoses, and other types of flexible elongated materials. In particular, with the growth of portable consumer electronics, the number of electrical cords, which can be used to either actively power or charge such electronics, has correspondingly increased, Electrical cords are also found associated with other applications such as sound transmission (e.g., earphone cords), visual signal transmission, and other electrical signal carriers, Because of the assortment of related electronic devices that people utilize day-to-day, there is a need to carry corresponding electrical cords for each such device to support electrical signal transmission associated with varying functionality.

[0004] Oftentimes numerous cords are stored and secured as a jumble and tangle of cords, which are troublesome when one needs to extract a single cord. Even when a single cord is present, it is often stored in a crumpled knotted structure, which requires significant effort to untangle. The securing and organization of these cords is time-consuming and laborious both when storing and when unwrapping for use. While numerous devices are available to help with the securing of such electrical cords, these devices can require substantial effort to implement, and/or can be easily misplaced, Accordingly, a need persists for devices and methods for securing cords and related materials.

I SUMMARY

[0005] Some embodiments of the present disclosure may be directed towards methods for securing a cord, such as an electrical cord. A cord-wrapper can be secured to a cord. A cord- wrapper can include an anchor, a bind-band, and a wrap-band. The bind-band and/or the wrap- band can be attached to the anchor. The bind-band can also act to orient the cord- wrapper, for instance the anchor can be configured to orient the anchor against the cord to hinder the anchor from moving along the cord's length. In some instances, the securing of the cord-wrapper can include stretching the bind-band to orient the cord between the bind-band and the anchor. The cord can be bundled in some manner, for instance the cord can be folded back and forth upon itself to form the bundled cord, or it can be coiled in some manner to form a bundled cord, The wrap-band can be secured around the bundled cord. For instance, the wrap-band can be stretched and/or wrapped around the bundled cord once or a multiplicity of times, which can result in constraining the cord in a bundled configuration. The anchor can also be oriented on the outside of the bundled cord, which can display a design and/or labeling/identifying feature of the anchor in some instances.

[0006] In some embodiments, the anchor of a cord-wrapper can include a disk. An anchor can include a design element, for example a design on a face of a disk and/or the entire anchor can be embodied as a design element (e.g., a heart-shaped disk), In other embodiments any one of the wrap-band and the bind-band can include an elastic material. The wrap-band and elastic-band can comprise a single ring of material. In some instances, any one of the bind-band and the wrap-band can form a loop structure. In instances where each of the bind-band and the wrap band are formed as a loop structure, the bind-band loop can be smaller than the wrap-band loop.

[0007] Other embodiments of the disclosure may be directed toward a cord- wrapper, which can be used to secure a bundled cord. The cord- wrapped can include any of the features described in the present application,

[0008] Further embodiments of the disclosure may be directed to a wrapped cord, which can include a bundled cord, and a cord-wrapper as described by any one of the features disclosed in the present application. In some instances, the bind-band can secure the bundled cord against the anchor, and/or the wrap-band can be stretched around the bundled cord.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0009] Aspects of the present disclosure will be more fully understood from the following detailed description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings (not necessarily drawn to scale), in which:

[0010] FIG. 1 A is perspective view of a cord- wrapper consistent with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

[001 1] FIG, IB is another perspective view of the cord- wrapper of FIG. 1 A;

[0012] FIG. 2 is a perspective view of another cord-wrapper consistent with embodiments of the present disclosure;

[0013] FIG. 3 is a perspective view of yet another cord-wrapper consistent with embodiments of the present disclosure;

[0014] FIG. 4 A is a view of a bind-band and a wrap-band of a cord-wrapper consistent with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

[0015] FIG. 4B is a view of an alternative bind-band and wrap-band of a cord-wrapper consistent with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

[0016] FIG , 5 is a perspective view of a cord- wrapper attached to a cord using the bind-band, consistent with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

[0017] FIGS. 6A-6C provides views of the use of a cord- wrapper to secure a cord, consistent with some embodiments of the present disclosure;

[0018] FIG. 7 is a perspective view of the use of a variant cord- wrapper to secure a cord, consistent with some embodiments of the present disclosure; [0019] FIG. 8 is a perspective view of the use of a variant cord- wrapper to secure a cord bundled in a coil, consistent with some embodiments of the present disclosure; and

[0020] FIGS, 9A-9C provide views of the use of a cord- wrapper's wrap-band to stretch and wrap around bundled cord, consistent with some embodiments of the present disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0021] Embodiments of the present disclosure can be directed to cord- wrappers for bundling cords, and methods of their use. While cord wrapping devices exist in the art for organizing cords, such devices suffer from a number of disadvantages.

[0022] Prior cord-wrappers, such as malleable wire structures; hook-and-loop fasteners, e.g., Velcro^® fasteners; or other binding agents are often separated from a bundled cord, e.g., a bundled electrical cord, when not in use. Accordingly, such cord-wrappers are easily misplaced and/or lost. Even when available, one still needs to orient the cord-wrapper in a particular orientation before the cord can be bundled and restrained from unbundling. Other cord-wrappers include devices that are attachable to a cord, but oftentimes move back and forth along the cord's length, requiring a user to position the cord-wrapper into a correct position each time it is to be used. Furthermore, cord-wrappers that use a hook-and-loop fastener can inadvertently attach to other hook-and-loop fasteners or cloth-like materials, e.g.. a Velcro^® fastener can attach to a Velcro^® fastener of another cord or can snag on other materials. Such inadvertent attachment can result in a tangle of cords or other items into a mass that needs to untangled and detached before use. Other prior cord-wrappers include devices that include slotted structures in which cords are inserted and held by the friction of the walls. These types of cord holders can cause the cord to be pinched or kinked in a manner that can damage the wiring of the cord, Finally, many cord-wrappers are not particularly attractive, and add negatively to the unsightly entanglement of wires that consumers increasingly find themselves dealing with,

[0023] Cord-wrappers, and methods of securing cords, in the present application can alleviate one or more of the aforementioned problems or disadvantages. For instance, cord- wrappers that utilize a bind-band in the form of a loop, for example as described in the present application, can easily be attached to an electrical cord, or other cord, without the use of hook-and-loop fasteners, or another binding agent, A bind-band can hinder the cord- wrapper from being easily separated from the cord. The hind-band can also position the cord-wrapper in a particular position along the cord's length so that realignment of the cord and cord- wrapper is not frequently needed. As well, in some embodiments, the use of a wrap-band in the form of a loop can alleviate the need for a hook-and-ioop fastener to restrain the cord from unbundling, As well, cord-wrappers as described in the present application can utilize an anchor connected to the bind-band and wrap- band. The anchor can be a design element, for example in the anchor's shape and/or as a design depicted on the anchor, to help enhance the attractiveness of the cord-wrapper itself,

[0024] Accordingly, embodiments of the disclosure described herein can include features that enable one or more of the advantages described previously. It should be understood that the descriptions and depictions of embodiments explicitly described herein are not meant to be limiting. That is, it is understood that other embodiments of the disclosure may include instances that utilize any possible combination of the features in the particular embodiments explicitly described herein. Accordingly, the scope of the disclosure should not be limited with respect to any particular embodiment described in the present application unless such is explicitly stated.

Cord-Wrappers and Wrapped Cords

[0025] Some embodiments of the disclosure are directed to a cord-wrapper, which can be configured to secure a cord that can be bundled together. In some instances, the cord- wrapper can be attached to the cord, e.g., using the cord- wrapper's bind-band, to conveniently maintain the cord-wrapper in proximity to the cord whether or not the cord is bundled and held by the cord -wrapper. In some embodiments, a cord- wrapper can include any of an anchor, a bind-band, and a wrap-band, though in some embodiments the cord- wrapper includes all three of these features. In general, in many instances, the elements of the cord-wrapper, e.g., the anchor, the bind-band, and/or the wrap-band are configured to obtain the functionality described in embodiments in the present application. In particular, in some embodiments, the element sizes may be selected depending upon the size of the cord to be bundled by the cord-wrapper. For instance, the wrap-band can be configured to be of sufficient size to constrict a bundled cord, The size of the wrap-band can also depend upon its elasticity, for example smaller wrap-bands loops can be used when the band can stretch substantially due to being constructed from a very elastic material. Thus, the smaller loop can expand enough to constrict the bundled cord.

[0026] it is understood that the embodiments described herein can be used with any cord, though with any of the embodiments described herein with a cord, the cord can be an electrical cord, such as sound transmission (e.g., earphone cords), power cords, USB adapters, visual signal transmission, and other electrical signal carriers. However, it is clear that a cord can be embodied as a rope, string, cable, hose, and/or other types of flexible elongated material.

[0027] Some embodiments are described with reference to, though not necessarily limited by, the particular cord- wrapper depicted in FIGS. 1A and IB. The cord-wrapper 100 may include an anchor 1 10, a wrap-band 120, and a bind-band 130, each band 120. 130 can b attached to the anchor 1 10. In some embodiments, the bind-band 130 can be configured to attach the anchor 110 to a cord, and/or can orient the anchor 1 10 and the cord relative to one another. In some instances, the wrap-band 120 is configured such that the band 120 can be positioned around a bundled cord, e.g., stretched around the bundled cord, and can form a constriction around the bundled cord to hold the bundled cord together.

[0028] As utilized by cord-wrappers throughout the present application, the anchor can be any object appropriately configured to achieve one or more of the functionalities described in the present application. For instance, the anchor can be any object capable of keeping the bind-band and wrap-band in a configuration such as those described in the present application. Anchors can be in a shape and size that can be configured to achieve one or more design features. For example, an anchor can be shaped as a disk, i.e., have opposite surfaces that are planar-like though the anchor can also have a thickness. Some specific instances of an anchor shaped as a disk are shown in FIGS. 1A, IB, and 2. As shown in FIG. IB, a surface of a disk-shaped anchor 1 10 can include a design element 140, though it is understood that such design elements need not be restricted to use with disk-shaped anchors. As well, the phrase "design element" can refer not only to fanciful depictions, but can also refer to identifying/labeling information, e.g., a way to distinguish cords from one another by the use of a "design element" as an identifier or label. In some instances, the anchor can itself be embodied as a design element, e.g., the heart-shaped anchor 210 of the cord-wrapper 200 in FIG. 2. It is also understood that anchors need not be embodied as disks but can also be embodied in any other shape, such as the ball-shaped anchor 310 shown with respect to the cord- wrapper 300 in FIG. 3,

[0029] Bind-bands and wrap-bands can each be formed from any material appropriate to achieve the functionalities described in the present application. In some embodiments, at least one of the bind-band and the wrap-band can be formed from an elastic material. Such embodiments can be advantageous in some instances, allowing the band to stretch to fit relative to a cord to be bundled, and/or to form a constriction to attach the cord- wrapper to a cord in a secure yet removable manner. Anchors can also be formed from any functionally-appropriate material, though in some instances it can be convenient to have the anchor embodied by a rigid plastic or other composite material that is easily formed into selected shapes as understood by a skilled artisan. The anchor may also include one or more fasteners to secure the cord-wrapper to surfaces, such as clothing of the user. The fasteners may include hooks, clips, adhesives, pins, and/or magnets.

[0030] As illustrated in FIGS. 1 A, IB, 2, and 3, though not necessarily restricted to the depicted devices, an anchor 110, 210, 31.0, the bind-band 130, 230,330, and wrap-band 120, 220, 320 can be configured so that each band 120, 130, 220, 230, 320, 330 can form a loop when attached to the anchor 1 10, 210, 310, In many embodiments, the bind-band loop Is smaller than the wrap- band loop in a cord-wrapper. Also, in some embodiments where the anchor is embodied as an object with at least, one planar-like surface, as exemplified by the anchors 1 10, 210 shown in FIGS. 1 A and 2, each bind-band and wrap-band can be attached to the same planar surface of the anchor, e.g., emerging from the same side of an anchor's side. Furthermore, in some

embodiments, the bind-band and wrap-band can be configured such that each band does not emerge from the same position as exemplified again in FIGS. 1 A and 2, though in some embodiments each band, or even different bands can emerge from the same position from the surface of an anchor.

[0031] Loops of a bind-band or wrap-band can be formed in a variety of manners when attached to their corresponding anchors. Some embodiments are shown in FIGS. 4A and 4B, As shown in FIG, 4A, each of the bind-band 430 and the wrap-band 420 of the cord-wrapper 400 is embodied as a separate ring of material, a hidden portion which is embedded in the structure of the anchor 410, It is also contemplated that each band may not be a complete ring or may have any other shape, such as ellipsoidal or rectangular. Each band 420, 430 can optionally be fixed to the anchor 410 to prevent movement of the ring through the anchor 410. In embodiments, as depicted in FIG. 2, the wrap-band 420 and the bind-band 430 may be substantially parallel to each other. In other embodiments, as depicted in FIG. 9A-9C, the wrap-band 920 may be substantially perpendicular to the bind-band 930.

[0032] As shown in FIG, 4B, the loop of the bind-band 435 and the loop of the wrap-band 425 may be embodied as a single ring of material that is partially embedded in the anchor 415 of the cord-wrapper 405. The ring can optionally be affixed to the anchor 415 to prevent its relative movement through the anchor 415, which would allow the bind-band loop 435 and the wrap- band loop 425 to keep their respective lengths fixed. However, other embodiments may allow the bands 425, 435 to change their relative sizes, such that the bind-band loop 435 may be constricted by manipulating (e.g. pulling) the wrap-band loop 425, and vice versa, It is understood that loops can be embodied in many other manners as well, e.g., any of the bind-band and loop-band can be embodied as a single non-continuous strand with an end of each strand affixed in some manner to the anchor of a cord- wrapper.

[0033] In some embodiments the attachment between a cord and the bind-band is secure enough to hinder the anchor from freely sliding along a cord but not so tightly attached to prevent a person from sliding the anchor along a cord's length. A particular embodiment of this is shown with respect to FIG. 5. An electrical cord 540 is attached to a cord-wrapper 500 using a bind- band 530, The bind-band 530 can be formed from an elastic material and can be configured to be attached to the anchor so that the bind-band can be stretched over the cord and is held against the cord by constriction of the elastic bind-band 530. The constriction can be configured to hinder the anchor from sliding along the cord's length by friction, but not so tight that a person cannot slide the anchor along the cord's length with some nominal effort to overcome the friction. In other circumstances, the bind-band 530 can act to keep the anchor 510 from separating from die cord, e.g., the bind-band is smaller than a plug on the end of an electrical cord, but can allow free movement of the anchor 510 along the cord's length. [0034] Embodiments of the disclosure where the cord-wrapper is configured to be attached, or actually attached, to a cord to be bundled, optionally by a bind-band that can be configured, for example, as described in the previous paragraph, can provide advantages over prior art devices used to bundle a cord. For example, as shown in FIG. 5, the cord-wrapper 500 can be attached to a cord 540 along its length as desired. In particular, because the bind-band 530 can constrict, keeping the cord~w^rrapper 500 against the cord 540, the cord-wrapper 500 can be kept at any convenient position, and optionally moved along the length of the cord 540 by simply manually sliding the anchor 510 along the cord's length. Thus, the cord- wrapper can be easily positioned along the cord, while keeping the cord-wrapper in a convenient position for cord wrapping. Even when the bind-band is loose enough to allow free movement of the anchor 510 along the cord's length, the bind-band can be configured small enough to hinder the cord- wrapper from slipping off the cord. The latter can prevent the inconvenient separation of the cord-wrapper from the cord. Prior art wrapping devices are often separated from cords while not in use for wrapping cords, resulting in their loss and misplacement.

[0035] Accordingly, other embodiments of the disclosure are directed cord- wrappers described in the present application that are attached to a cord, e.g., an electrical cord. Such attachment can be achieved by a bind-band.

[0036] Further embodiments are directed to wrapped cords that can include the ensemble of a cord and a cord-wrapper. The cord can be bundled in some manner, i.e., the cord is draped in some manner to overlap itself, which can make the cord more orderly and/or compact. For example, the cord can be folded back and forth upon itself as exemplified by the cord 640 shown in FIGS. 6A-6C. In another example, the cord 840 can be configured as a coil as exemplified in FIG. 8. The cord-wrapper can in some instances include an anchor, a bind-band, and a wrap- band. The bind-band can be attached to the anchor, and can secure the cord against the anchor. The wrap-band can be attached to the anchor, and can be stretched around the bundled cord, which can keep the cord bundled together in orderly fashion. Some exemplary illustrations of a wrapped cord are shown in FIG. 6C and FIG. 7. As shown in FIG. 6C, the wrapped cord 600 may include a bundled cord 640 that is coupled to the anchor 610 by a wrap-band 620 that is wrapped around the bundled cord 640 a plurality of times. I n particular, bundled cord 640 is positioned between the anchor 610 and the wrap-band 620, In contrast as shown in FIG. 7, the wrapped cord 700 may include the bundled cord 740 that is wrapped around once by the wrap- band 720, While these embodiments are described with respect to some explicitly described features of cord-wrappers, it is understood that other cord- wrappers can also be used with wrapped cords as described above, including any of the cord-wrappers, and features associated therewith, described in the present application.

Methods for Wrapping Cords

[0037] Some embodiments of the disclosure are directed to methods for securing a cord (e.g., an electrical cord), by bundling the cord and keeping it secured using a cord-wrapper in one instance. The cord-wrapper to be used with such methods can be any suitable cord-wrapper, which can also include any of the cord- wrappers described in the present application. In some embodiments, the cord-wrapper may include an anchor, a bind-band, and a wrap-band, the hind- band and/or the wrap-band being optionally attached to the anchor. The cord-wrapper can be secured to a cord, for instance by wrapping a loop of the bind-band 530 around the cord 540. The bind-band can act to orient the cord against the anchor, e.g., a length of the cord is oriented and/or secured between the bind-band and the anchor. Furthermore, as shown in FIG. 5, the position of the anchor 510 along the length of the cord 540 is held by the bind-band 530. As well, the face of the anchor 510 facing into the page of FIG. 5, is also oriented by the bind-band 530. This can be advantageous when that face has a design element which a user of the cord- wrapper wishes to display in a direction away from the bundled cord.

[0038] The cord to be secured by the cord-wrapper can be bundled together. In one embodiment as shown in FIG. 7, the cord can be bundled by folding the cord back-and-forth upon itself to form bundled cord 740. In another embodiment as shown in FIG. 8, the cord can be bundled by forming a coil that is the bundled cord 840. The wrap-band can be secured around the bundled cord, which can result in keeping the bundled cord from unbundling, and constraining the cord in an easily stored configuration that does not tangle as the cord is stored and/or transported. In some embodiments, the wrap-band can be secured around the bundled cord where the bundled cord is positioned so that bundled cord is within a loop of the wrap-band. Non-limiting examples are shown in FIGS, 6-8. [0039] When one or more of the bands is small enough and made of an elastic material, the loop of the bands can self-constrict around the cord to keep the cord in a bundled configuration. This is exemplified in FIG. 7, in which the hind-band 730 may self-constrict around a single length of the cord 740 to keep the anchor 710 in a preferred position along the cord 740, while the wrap- band 720 may self-constrict around multiple bundled lengths of the cord 740 to keep the cord 740 from unbundling, such that a single loop of the wrap-band 720 may be sufficient to secure the bundled cord 740. In this situation, the area circumscribed by the bind-band loop's opening can be smaller than the cross-sectional area of the cord but the bind-band 730 is stretchable to constrict around the cord's width. The bind-band 730 positions the anchor 710 along the cord's length, and can also act to face the anchor 710 such that a design element can be facing away from the bundled cord 740,

[0040] In some embodiments, where the wrap-band has a loop opening that is larger than the bundled cord width, the wrap-band can be wrapped around the bundled cord a plurality of times to secure the wrap-band around the bundled cord. FIGS, 6A-6C illustrate one instance of these embodiments. As shown in FIG. 6 A, a length of the cord 640 may be passed through the wrap- band 620 and the bind-band 630 to initially secure and/or orient the cord 640 to the anchor 610. This passing step may be performed during manufacturing, such that the bind-band 630 may be permanently secured to the cord 640, or alternatively, the bind-band 630 may be releasably secured to the cord 640, such that the passing step is performed when the user wants to bundle the cord 640. The anchor 610 can be held in place by the bind-band 630 to orient the anchor 610 along the bundled cord 640, such that the bind-band 630 may only receive a non-bundled portion (e.g. single length) of the cord 640. The cord 640 may then be bundled and positioned within the loop of the wrap- band 620 along the anchor 610. As shown in FIG. 6B, the wrap-band 620 can then be twisted to form two separate loops having one loop initially surrounding the bundled cord 640, and the other loop can then be brought around the bundled cord 640 as depicted by the arrow in FIG. 6B, When the wrap-band 620 is made of elastic material, both loops of the wrap- band 620 can self-constrict around the bundled cord 640 to secure the wrap-band 620 around the bundled cord 640 as shown in FIG. 6C. The wrap-band 620 can be secured over and then tucked between the bundled cord 640 and the anchor 610, as shown in FIG. 6C, to form a secure bundling of the cord 640, e.g. such that the bundled cord 640 does not unravel. The step depicted in FIG. 6B-6C may be repeated until desired tension in the wrap-band 620 is applied to secure the bundled cord 640. In another instance, as shown in FIG. 8, the bundled cord 840 forms a coll with the wrap-band 820 being double looped around a portion of the coil circumference. The anchor 810 is held in place by bind-band 830 to position the anchor 810 on the outside of the coil.

[0041] Using wrap-bands with larger loops can be advantageous. While wrap-bands configured to secure cords without multiple wrapping as shown in FIG. 7 are very convenient, such cord- wrappers can be limited to use with cords where the bundled cord and wrap-band may be each configured to allow the wrap-band to self-constrict the bundled cord, e.g., the cord cannot be too large and/or the loop of the wrap-band cannot be too large. However, embodiments where the wrap-band can be wrapped around the bundled cord a plurality of times can accommodate more cords of varying length as smaller bundled cords can be secured simply by wrapping the wrap- band enough times to bind the bundled cord. It is understood that while FIG. 6C shows a wrap- band being wrapped twice around the bundled cord, other embodiments may wrap the wrap-band around the bundled cord additional times as needed to secure the wrap-band around the bundled cord.

[0042] It should be understood that variations from, the explicit illustrated methods described in the present application are within the scope of what it disclosed herein. For example, bundling of cords need not be in a back-and-forth or coiled structure. As well, the stretching and wrapping of a wrap-band around a bundled cord need not be performed precisely as described by the particular embodiments shown in FIGS. 6-8, For instance an alternative example is shown in FIGS. 9A-9C. The wrap-band, embodied as a loop 920, can be stretched and wrapped around the bundled cord 940 one or more times as depicted in FIGS. 9A and 9B, without locating the bundled cord 940 within the loop of the wrap-band 920. One end of the wrap-band 920 is held in place by the anchor 910 which can be coupled to the bundled cord 940 by the bind-band 930. When enough slack in the wrap-band 920 has been taken up by looping around the bundled cord 940 one or more times (only once as depicted in FIGS. 9B-9C), the remaining loop can be secured to the anchor 910, for example, by threading the anchor 910 into the remaining loop and tucking the loop 920 between the bundled cord 940 and the anchor 910 to secure the bundled cord 940 as depicted in FIG. 9C, In this embodiment, the bind-band 930 may be positioned centrally on the anchor 910 while the wrap-band 920 may be positioned peripherally on the anchor 910 and substantially perpendicular of the bind-band 930, such that the wrap-band 920 can be wrapped over the cord 940 while the cord 940 is secured to the anchor 910 by the bind- band 930. Indeed, many other such wrapping and stretching configurations are well within the knowledge of the skilled artisan, and are thus encompassed in the present application.

EQUIVALENTS

[0043] While the present disclosure has been described in terms of specific methods, structures, and devices it is understood that variations and modifications will occur to those skilled in the ait upon consideration of the present disclosure. For instance, the steps of the methods described herein can be rearranged in any suitable order so long as the method's functionality is physically feasible. As well, the features illustrated or described in connection with one embodiment can be combined with the features of other embodiments. Such modifications and variations are intended to be included within the scope of the present disclosure. Those skilled in the art will appreciate, or be able to ascertain using no more than routine experimentation, further features and advantages of the disclosure based on the above-described embodiments. Accordingly, the disclosure is not to be limited by what has been particularly shown and described, except as indicated by the appended claims.

[0044] All publications and references are herein expressly incorporated by reference in their entirety. The terms "a" and "an" can be used interchangeably, and are equivalent to the phrase "one or more" as utilized in the present application. The terms "comprising," "having,"

"including," and "containing" are to be construed as open-ended terms (i.e., meaning "including, but not limited to,") unless otherwise noted. Recitation of ranges of values herein are merely intended to serve as a shorthand method of referring individually to each separate value falling within the range, unless otherwise indicated herein, and each separate value is incorporated into the specification as if it were individually recited herein. All methods described herein can be performed in any suitable order unless otherwise indicated herein or otherwise clearly contradicted by context. The use of any and all examples, or exemplary language (e.g., "such as") provided herein, is intended merely to better illuminate the disclosure and does not pose a limitation on the scope of the disclosure unless otherwise claimed. No language in the specification should be construed as indicating any non-claimed element as essential to the practice of the disclosure.

Claims

CLAIMS What is claimed is:

1. A method of securing a cord to a cord-wrapper having a bind-band, a wrap-band, and an anchor, the method comprising:

passing a length of the cord through the bind-band to initially secure the cord against the anchor;

bundling the cord; and

constraining the bundled cord with the wrap-band.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the passing step is performed prior to the bundling step.

3. The method of claim 1, further including constricting the bind-band to hold the cord against the anchor prior to the constraining step,

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the constricting step is performed by

manipulating the wrap-band.

5. The method of claim 1, firrther including self-constricting at least one of the bind-band and the wrap-band to frictionally secure the cord.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the bundling step includes folding the cord back and forth upon itself.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the bundling step includes forming a coil from the cord.

8. The method of claim 1 , further including twisting the wrap-band to form a first loop and a second loop, and bringing the second loop around the bundled cord.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the constraining step includes wrapping the wrap- band around the bundled cord one or more times,

10. The method of claim 1 , further including securing the wrap-band to the anchor after the bundling step.

1 . A cord-wrapper for securing a cord comprising:

an anchor;

a bind-band attached to the anchor and configured to receive a length of the cord; and a wrap-band attached to the anchor and configured to be stretched around the cord after being bundled.

12. The cord- wrapper of claim 1 1 , wherein the anchor comprises a disk.

13. The cord- rapper of claim 11, wherein each of the bind-band and the wrap-band comprise an elastic material.

14. The cord- wrapper of claim 1 1, wherein the bind-band and the wrap-band are formed from a single ring of material embedded in the anchor.

15. The cord- wrapper of claim 11, wherein the bind-band and the wrap-band are formed from separate rings of material embedded in the anchor.

16. The cord- wrapper of claim 1 1., wherein the bind-band is substantially parallel to the wrap-band,

17. The cord- wrapper of claim 1 1, wherein at least one of the bind-band and the wrap-band self-constricts to frictionally secure the cord,

18. The cord- wrapper of claim 11 , wherein the bind-band includes a bind-band loop, the wrap-band includes a wrap-band loop, and the bind-band loop is smaller than the wrap-band loop.

19. The cord-wrapper of claim 1 1 , wherein the anchor comprises a design element.

20. A system, comprising:

a cord having a bundled portion including a plurality of overlapping lengths of the cord; and

a cord-wrapper including;

an anchor;

a bind-band attached to the anchor and receiving only a single length of the cord; and

a wrap-band being attached to the anchor and receiving the bundled portion of the cord.