OK SO you know how I talk a lot about weird misuses of connectors on aliexpress and such?

I have found the worst one. Brace yourself, this is NSFW...

SO... imagine you are building a sex machine.

OK NO, not in the James Brown sense, in the mechanized thrusting sense.
You don't want to just build a dildo into it, because that makes it a pain to clean and you can't swap out for different styles and sizes.

So you need to have some kind of connector between your chosen sex toy and your sex machine itself.
And it would be nice to have that be standardized, right? so you can buy sex toys from many places, or use the same toys with multiple machines...

And like everything in the world, there's like 8 standards.
of course there is.

So the older of the connectors is the Vac-U-Lock, which is a trademark of Doc Johnson (who make sex toys)
This one was designed for strap-on systems, apparently? but got reused for sex machines.

The company "Hismith" seems to be the center of the sex machine world these days, and they make several connector types.
One of them is the "Quick Air Connector", which is a reuse of some pneumatic connector.

PROBABLY because it was too easy to clone that one, they also have their own KlicLok system, which is a weird octagonal connector

And the scariest (but still not worst, I'm working my way up to that one) is this one.
Isn't it odd? Why is this so strange?

because this isn't actually a sex-machine-to-sex-toy connector.
it's a sex-machine-connector that adapts a sex toy to something that's not a sex machine...

It's a connector for a reciprocating saw!

I need an adult.

BUT THAT'S STILL NOT AS BAD AS THE NEXT ONE.

So, for the next one, they wanted to use a sturdy connector that was widely available, and for a cheap cost...

"sturdy" rules out most consumer connectors, so we're not gonna have a sex machine using a USB cable or a HDMI cable... not even DisplayPort would work.

But maybe if we go slightly more professional?

Well, here's one of the machines... see #1? Does that look at all familiar?

HOW ABOUT NOW?

Yeah, the connector is XLR.

XLR is a connector from the 1950s, mainly used for audio (in the 3-pin form) Professional microphones tend to use it, and many PA systems...

XLR5 is the standard connector for DMX, which is the standard for stage lighting.

But since it's been commonly made for ~70 years XLR connectors are super cheap, widely available, and they're quite sturdy.

So why not use them for a sex machine? WHY NOT INDEED, HISMITH?

BTW, I thought for a brief moment that there might actually be a reason for all this:
Maybe they're using XLR3 because they need to run power to vibrators or other Powered Sexy Things that you might attach to a sex machine?

but no, from what I can see, they're not powering the connectors at all. it's just reusing XLR because they're commonly available and cheap.

anyway I have to go clean my eyes and erase my browser history and delete my aliexpress account.

alternatively I should get a motor and some tubes and build my own sex machine, and come up with an even stupider connector for them.
RJ45 ethernet?
DB9 serial?
30-pin Centronics?
50-ohm BNC?

and not to get off topic and derail this into my 19th "weird connectors I found on aliexpress" thread (which it kinda already is), but check out this Industrial Square Ethernet connector I found while finding those pictures:

and after talking about abusing connectors for use in sex machines, these sorts of stock images are hitting a little different

YEAH, THE ONES FOR ADULTS. I HOPE THAT IS THE ONLY KIND YOU SELL, ALIEXPRESS?!

BTW, the use of these various connectors by hismith means you can get cursed adapters like this, which are XLR on one end and quick air connector on the other end.

because naturally you might need to convert between compressed air and balanced stereo

I also discovered Hismith has an official youtube channel, where they've uploaded a bunch of short videos of their connectors latching and unlatching.
Like so:

can I sue this site for stealing my band name?
I play bass for Dixon Hex and the Octagonal Nipples!

I was looking at patents and now I'm scared

This is the patent for Hismith's sex machine design, btw:

https://patents.google.com/patent/USD824036S1/en

it doesn't include the attachment, which is the part I was interested in

hey foone, what's your cyberpunk name?

The thing I'm looking for is this, because as someone on discord pointed out, there's no way they custom designed and manufactured this. They're reusing some connector from something else.
And I'm trying to figure out what.

it definitely appears to be very similar to a pneumatic quick-release coupler, but after looking through a lot of aliexpress I think it might be a custom-made variant of them. the octagonal end piece and the lack of a hole is very distinctive and unusual.

They may have had some custom connectors made to make it harder for their products to be cloned, and to prevent compatible unlicensed, uh, "add-ons"

can't wait to see the first sex machine with DRM that won't accept unlicensed dildos, you have to get the ones from the manufacturer

it's too bad they didn't go for the 4-pin XLR, they could have just run USB over it, with a simple microcontroller inside each attachment...

hey, I just found something similar! It's hexagonal, but similar enough that I'm sure it's related.
And guess what it is? A quick-release mic stand!
Clearly the designer of this machine has a musical background...

from some angles you can see "You Tian" on the connectors, and there's a maker of pneumatic connectors that look very similar.

so yeah. custom variants of existing cables.

and by cables I of course mean connectors.

BTW, if you want to scary audio production friends, send them this picture, which I'm intentionally breaking the link for (it's a vibrator/dildo with an XLR plug sticking out the back)

ae01.alicdn
.com/kf/H5ec389a23c6a4bd8a65c8fc47725a7a8e.jpg