[chbot] Choc Fish Challenge #5

[Mark Atherton]

Cass,

I am not sure if your solution will work, but your reasoning is 
thoroughly excellent.

Well done.

-Mark

At 11:43 a.m. 5/09/2011, you wrote:
>I work out 2km:
>
>At the first end (end A) you connect all the wires together in pairs,
>leaving 2 unpaired as single conductors, then you attach the negative
>lead to one of the single wires and the positive to one of the pairs.
>label the negative wire as 4 and the other unpaired wire as 1, you
>then walk to the other end (end B). (1km so far)
>
>Now at end B you try all the wires with the bulb untill you find the
>three live wires, you should be able to determine the positive end
>from the negative by there being two positive wires and only one
>negative, label the negative wire 4,
>
>Now connect the negative wire to one of the other wires that isn't
>positive, you should be able to find which wire its paired with at end
>A by another wire in the group becoming negative, label the wire you
>connected to the negative as 5 and the lead the becomes negative as 6
>
>The only wire this wont work for is the unpaired wire you labeled at
>the other end that wasn't negative. when you find this wire label it
>as 1 to match the other end and connect it to one of the positive
>wires, label the two positive wires, label the one connected to wire 1
>as 2 and the other one as 3.
>
>Leaving each connection in place repeat that process of finding the
>pairs using the new negative lead until all of the wires are connected
>in series except the three now positive leads (1, 2 and 3). label each
>new wire you connect as one higher than the last newly found negative
>wire you labeled and each new negative you find as one higher than
>that, such that the wires are connected in order, 4 is connected to 5
>is connected to 6 is connected to 7 etc until all 120 are labeled at
>end B.
>
>Walk back to the end A (now having walked 2km)
>Now we can determine the order of the positive leads by disconnecting
>2 and 3 from each other and the positive terminal then by connecting
>the positive terminal to each of them in turn until you find which is
>connected to 1. label that wire as 2 and the other as 3. We can forget
>about these three wires now.
>
>Now hooking up one side of the tester bulb straight to the positive
>terminal of the battery and leaving the negative terminal attached to
>the original negative wire, 4, disconnect one pair at a time,
>reconnecting it before trying the next pair, until you find the pair
>that when you disconnect it, it leaves all the other pairs connected
>to the negative terminal. (you'll need some exposed conductor where
>you've bridged wires to test against). You can now label those two
>wires you have just disconnected, one will still be negative and the
>other wont, the one that isn't negative is wire 120, and the one that
>is still negative is 119.
>
>Now leaving the newly labeled pair disconnected, repeat this process
>untill you've found the next pair that leaves the all the pairs still
>connected to negative, disconnect that pair and label accordingly, one
>less than the last pair, with the wire that is still connected to
>negative as the lower number of the two.
>
>Repeat the whole process untill you've labelled all of the wires.