4b Doesn't Exist!!!

Mwedzi, you just confirmed the point I'm trying to make. Pen springs are how 4B is shaped. The reason you don't see this in the middle of your strands but see it at the ends, is because the middle is manipulated during styling so that the coil direction is bent the unnatural way over and over so that it never gets a chance to revert to its natural pattern.

To prove my point I undid my extension braid to show you the zigzag pattern attributed to 4B. The braiding action bends the coil backwards against its normal direction then forward in agreement with its direction then backward...leading to sections that look curved and some that look square.

This pic shows my hair straight after I removed the braid extension before detangling. Notice the "square" shape that would lead you to believe my hair had a natural zigzag:

4bHairStraightOutofaBraid-vi.jpg


Here's another view with an undeniable zigzag shape:
4BZigzagShapefromBraiding-vi.jpg


When I separate all the strands using fingers, I end up with this pattern that's hard to define. You can see waves and curves and maybe a few corners and the hair seems to have a mind of its own, going every which way when strands are lying side by side. No strand looks like another:
tangledZigzagShapeFromBraiding-vi.jpg


Yes, because type 4B hair is usually worn in ways that affect its pattern, we have all grown to believe that' zigzag/no direction curves the true shape of the hair's strands. But I beg to disagree. And to this prove my point, I will return to that very section of zigzag hair to show you how type 4B hair behaves when naked and not manipulated by styling. First I want to show you the difference between braided hair (seen above) and hair worn in a twist that is small enough to almost imitate its coil pattern. Now I know most of you will say that it's the twist-out effect that causes it to look coily but that idea will be squashed when we return to the zigzag section above.

I like wearing bangs w/o extensions at the front of my hair. When I twist my hair w/o extensions in small twists, I usually don't twist the very tips of my hair, but just kinda roll that around my fingers so that the pen springs are pressed in a way for them to interlock. Now because the twists are small--almost the size of my natural coils--the hair seems to retain its natural pattern. Here's a pic of me wearing twisted bangs (Sorry about the poor pic quality. This was before I bought a digicam and was using an ancient webcam.):

Picture26-vi.jpg


Here's a close up of how the ends looked after a wash while airdrying. The hair is not untwisted. Each individual spiral you see is the end of a twist--the untwisted part that I previously pressed together (Forgive the quality of the pics again. Same lousy webcam is to blame):

Twistspirals-vi.jpg


That is the natural shape of my strands. You can tell that because they are interlocking the way springs might if you pressed them together so the follow the same pattern.

Below are pics I took during a different experiment before using my new digicam and you can see again, on the pic to the right showing untwisted hair, the interlocking of the wet strands like pen springs pressed together:
WetTwistWetTwistout-vi.jpg


Right now I'm wearing braided bangs w/o extensions. I twist the ends instead of braiding to the end and then just press the very tip and twist the entire section as explained above. I have tried to separate that end so you can see how the very tip that I don't manipulate with braiding looks. You can see the untouched tip forms circular spirals ie tiny curls:

enstylingfollowsnaturalpattern-vi.jpg


Anyway, let's go back to the section of zigzag hair I took out of a braid earlier in this post. I have just applied conditioner (Trader Joe's) to the dry hair and already you can see it going back to its "preferred" state, ie the state it would be in if I hadn't manipulated it and forced it into a braid shape. In the first pic below (top left) you can see my hair slowly responding to moisture from the conditioner and slowly reverting from the stretched zigzag state caused by braiding. In the lower pics, you see my hair fully reverted to its natural state:
ghwhenHairsDampwithConditioner-vi.jpg


After I rinsed out the conditioner, this is how it looked wet with its cute curved curls/coils becoming evident. No corners or zigzags here:
4BCurlsClearinWetNakedHair-vi.jpg


And below you see it when it is fairly dry.
kedHairShowsNaturalCurlPattern-vi.jpg

There's no denying baby curls in there, I don't care what anyone says. :lol: I see spirals, very tiny ones that I would hate to have to untangle if my whole head was in them--hence the reason I never wash my hair out of braids or twists, nor do I ever do wash- n-gos coz lawd knows my strands have mad love for each other and trying to get in between their heavy petting is asking for a long list of ailments (headaches, high blood pressure, stress.... :lachen: )

Here's a final pic of my 4B hair completely dry w/ no products.
4BHairCompletelyDryNoProducts-vi.jpg

Again, I see tiny curls and a uniform pattern in all the strands reminiscent of pen springs. :yep: In the pic on the left I was stretching it a bit like you would springs and going boing boing :lol: , and on the right, I've let go and it bounces back to lovely, soft, petite curls. :love:

(Hi I'm Nonie and I admit I'm insanely obsessed w/ my hair. :hide: )



So that's my story and I'm sticking to it: My 4B hair has curls/coils/spirals that are uniform all through. I am responsible for the times when they aren't evident because of my manipulating them when styling. :)
 
Let me see if I can find the thread, with the ladies who posted their 4b hair... A relxed ladie who was 4b wanted to see some natural with their pics.

Clear difference between 4a and 4b, however you can see the difference more if the person is mostly or all 4b texture...

Also, Please dont say things dont exist if you dont know! It's upseting for those who know better...thanks :lachen:
 
Mwedzi, you just confirmed the point I'm trying to make. Pen springs are how 4B is shaped. The reason you don't see this in the middle of your strands but see it at the ends, is because the middle is manipulated during styling so that the coil direction is bent the unnatural way over and over so that it never gets a chance to revert to its natural pattern.

To prove my point I undid my extension braid to show you the zigzag pattern attributed to 4B. The braiding action bends the coil backwards against its normal direction then forward in agreement with its direction then backward...leading to sections that look curved and some that look square.

This pic shows my hair straight after I removed the braid extension before detangling. Notice the "square" shape that would lead you to believe my hair had a natural zigzag:

4bHairStraightOutofaBraid-vi.jpg


Here's another view with an undeniable zigzag shape:
4BZigzagShapefromBraiding-vi.jpg


When I separate all the strands using fingers, I end up with this pattern that's hard to define. You can see waves and curves and maybe a few corners and the hair seems to have a mind of its own, going every which way when strands are lying side by side. No strand looks like another:
tangledZigzagShapeFromBraiding-vi.jpg


Yes, because type 4B hair is usually worn in ways that affect its pattern, we have all grown to believe that' zigzag/no direction curves the true shape of the hair's strands. But I beg to disagree. And to this prove my point, I will return to that very section of zigzag hair to show you how type 4B hair behaves when naked and not manipulated by styling. First I want to show you the difference between braided hair (seen above) and hair worn in a twist that is small enough to almost imitate its coil pattern. Now I know most of you will say that it's the twist-out effect that causes it to look coily but that idea will be squashed when we return to the zigzag section above.

I like wearing bangs w/o extensions at the front of my hair. When I twist my hair w/o extensions in small twists, I usually don't twist the very tips of my hair, but just kinda roll that around my fingers so that the pen springs are pressed in a way for them to interlock. Now because the twists are small--almost the size of my natural coils--the hair seems to retain its natural pattern. Here's a pic of me wearing twisted bangs (Sorry about the poor pic quality. This was before I bought a digicam and was using an ancient webcam.):

Picture26-vi.jpg


Here's a close up of how the ends looked after a wash while airdrying. The hair is not untwisted. Each individual spiral you see is the end of a twist--the untwisted part that I previously pressed together (Forgive the quality of the pics again. Same lousy webcam is to blame):

Twistspirals-vi.jpg


That is the natural shape of my strands. You can tell that because they are interlocking the way springs might if you pressed them together so the follow the same pattern.

Below are pics I took during a different experiment before using my new digicam and you can see again, on the pic to the right showing untwisted hair, the interlocking of the wet strands like pen springs pressed together:
WetTwistWetTwistout-vi.jpg


Right now I'm wearing braided bangs w/o extensions. I twist the ends instead of braiding to the end and then just press the very tip and twist the entire section as explained above. I have tried to separate that end so you can see how the very tip that I don't manipulate with braiding looks. You can see the untouched tip forms circular spirals ie tiny curls:

enstylingfollowsnaturalpattern-vi.jpg


Anyway, let's go back to the section of zigzag hair I took out of a braid earlier in this post. I have just applied conditioner (Trader Joe's) to the dry hair and already you can see it going back to its "preferred" state, ie the state it would be in if I hadn't manipulated it and forced it into a braid shape. In the first pic below (top left) you can see my hair slowly responding to moisture from the conditioner and slowly reverting from the stretched zigzag state caused by braiding. In the lower pics, you see my hair fully reverted to its natural state:
ghwhenHairsDampwithConditioner-vi.jpg


After I rinsed out the conditioner, this is how it looked wet with its cute curved curls/coils becoming evident. No corners or zigzags here:
4BCurlsClearinWetNakedHair-vi.jpg


And below you see it when it is fairly dry.
kedHairShowsNaturalCurlPattern-vi.jpg

There's no denying baby curls in there, I don't care what anyone says. :lol: I see spirals, very tiny ones that I would hate to have to untangle if my whole head was in them--hence the reason I never wash my hair out of braids or twists, nor do I ever do wash- n-gos coz lawd knows my strands have mad love for each other and trying to get in between their heavy petting is asking for a long list of ailments (headaches, high blood pressure, stress.... :lachen: )

Here's a final pic of my 4B hair completely dry w/ no products.
4BHairCompletelyDryNoProducts-vi.jpg

Again, I see tiny curls and a uniform pattern in all the strands reminiscent of pen springs. :yep: In the pic on the left I was stretching it a bit like you would springs and going boing boing :lol: , and on the right, I've let go and it bounces back to lovely, soft, petite curls. :love:

(Hi I'm Nonie and I admit I'm insanely obsessed w/ my hair. :hide: )



So that's my story and I'm sticking to it: My 4B hair has curls/coils/spirals that are uniform all through. I am responsible for the times when they aren't evident because of my manipulating them when styling. :)

Thanks for posting all the pics! I got inexplicably excited, lol.

The big difference between 4a and 4b hair now is the clumping factor imo.

What makes hair clump?
 
I don't know what it should be called - 4b, 15j, or something else, but my hair is at the extreme end of whatever the spectrum is and there is no questioning that there are no curls.
 
Let me see if I can find the thread, with the ladies who posted their 4b hair... A relxed ladie who was 4b wanted to see some natural with their pics.

Clear difference between 4a and 4b, however you can see the difference more if the person is mostly or all 4b texture...

Also, Please dont say things dont exist if you dont know! It's upseting for those who know better...thanks :lachen:

Shoot... I aint trying to mess with nobody here. Sometimes things get HEATED :lachen:

That's why I wrote my little disclaimer in the beginning of the thread.
 
I agree, never seen it, could exist, but i dunno all the supposed "4b's" i see usually comb their curl pattern out or have a really tight pattern that lacks a shine and has sheen instead, its curly, but extremely tight, and doesn't respond as readily to curly hair products/styles as readily, but when wet, there is some type of curl......

*runs out of thread*


ETA: isn't the zigzag in the pics posted from the hair being braided? Anyone who unbraids their hair will have zigzags, the wet pics are still very curly. Small curls, but curls nonetheless. :look:
 
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I agree, never seen it, could exist, but i dunno all the supposed "4b's" i see usually comb their curl pattern out or have a really tight pattern that lacks a shine and has sheen instead, its curly, but extremely tight, and doesn't respond as readily to curly hair products/styles as readily, but when wet, there is some type of curl......

*runs out of thread*

I think you nailed. Most 4B comb it out because left to its own devices, it'd lock up and "clump" as someone said. Now about not responding to curl products, I really believe it does, but I think most people expect to see big curls like type 3 hair. But instead we get tiny curls that are so hard to see. Also rather than hang from the weight of curl product revealing shape, our hair may just curl back on itself. That's what happened when I followed wash-n-go directions that someone recommended. I was promised bouncy curls like my friend gets when she does this (I think she has 4A hair). But instead my 9-11 inch hair that year just curled back on itself and looked like what 4B hair looks: no definition (This was supposed to be a fluffy wash-n-go puff but this is what lots of products do to my hair):

FirstAttemptataPuff-vi.jpg


Below is a pic of my hair after curl activator is applied. The curls do get defined but their size makes them so hard to see that it's easy to assume that 4B hair does not respond to curl products. BTW, for curl products to work on my hair, they have to be the only thing applied to my hair so they can reach all strands and do their thing. Layering many products just seems to make my hair dull and "shapeless" for want of a better word. :lol: Methinks that's because the other products block the curling ones from reaching strands. I probably should mention that I never knew I had uniform spirals until I stopped using products that coated my hair eg CON shampoo and started the no leave-in regimen. Not saying it will work for everyone, but just making the point that simplicity does bring out true texture.

Mwedzi, you and I need to get together coz I'ma get your hair to act like I know it should. :lol: I get shed hairs that look like that too but I can bet my bottom dollar if I were to soak them long enough, they'd coil like my hair does. You have to remember, I don't use products, so there's less chance of products blocking water from getting to the strands. And I don't think weight has anything to do with how the middle of the hair strands will look. Coz my strands have the same coily shape through their length, only they are way tinier than 4A.

Anyway, I dunno about all y'all but I have 4B hair with coils and curls that are uniform all through the length. So there! :lol:
 

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Mwedzi, you just confirmed the point I'm trying to make. Pen springs are how 4B is shaped. The reason you don't see this in the middle of your strands but see it at the ends, is because the middle is manipulated during styling so that the coil direction is bent the unnatural way over and over so that it never gets a chance to revert to its natural pattern.

But see, the difference between what you're doing and what I did is that you're taking hair directly out of a braid and showing it to me. What I did was I took loose shed hair, soaked them in water, and then let them fall against a surface and shrink up like they wanted to. Saying the middle is bent because it's undergone styling so much that it won't revert doesn't work in this case. The hair at the ends, being the oldest hair on my head, has undergone more styling and manipulation than the hairs at the middle, so if anything should be the less true pattern, it should be the ends, not the middle. I think the reason you are likely to see more sproinginess at the ends and not the middle is just because the ends don't have as much hair hanging down on them. Neither part is any more or less my real hair than the other, they are just in different parts along the strand. In fact, the hair near the bulb is the straightest for this same reason, and it's undergone the least manipulation. When I twist or braid, I can't even get to the first inch or two of my roots, so rarely even get stretched. but they have the most weight on them. This is also an equally real pattern to my hair.

But again, I still think that the real test is how the hair behaves on our heads rather than in isolation because we don't wear our hair in isolation. It's just really hard to get a good picture like that.
 
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Mwedzi, you just confirmed the point I'm trying to make. Pen springs are how 4B is shaped. The reason you don't see this in the middle of your strands but see it at the ends, is because the middle is manipulated during styling so that the coil direction is bent the unnatural way over and over so that it never gets a chance to revert to its natural pattern.

To prove my point I undid my extension braid to show you the zigzag pattern attributed to 4B. The braiding action bends the coil backwards against its normal direction then forward in agreement with its direction then backward...leading to sections that look curved and some that look square.

This pic shows my hair straight after I removed the braid extension before detangling. Notice the "square" shape that would lead you to believe my hair had a natural zigzag:

4bHairStraightOutofaBraid-vi.jpg


Here's another view with an undeniable zigzag shape:
4BZigzagShapefromBraiding-vi.jpg


When I separate all the strands using fingers, I end up with this pattern that's hard to define. You can see waves and curves and maybe a few corners and the hair seems to have a mind of its own, going every which way when strands are lying side by side. No strand looks like another:
tangledZigzagShapeFromBraiding-vi.jpg


Yes, because type 4B hair is usually worn in ways that affect its pattern, we have all grown to believe that' zigzag/no direction curves the true shape of the hair's strands. But I beg to disagree. And to this prove my point, I will return to that very section of zigzag hair to show you how type 4B hair behaves when naked and not manipulated by styling. First I want to show you the difference between braided hair (seen above) and hair worn in a twist that is small enough to almost imitate its coil pattern. Now I know most of you will say that it's the twist-out effect that causes it to look coily but that idea will be squashed when we return to the zigzag section above.

I like wearing bangs w/o extensions at the front of my hair. When I twist my hair w/o extensions in small twists, I usually don't twist the very tips of my hair, but just kinda roll that around my fingers so that the pen springs are pressed in a way for them to interlock. Now because the twists are small--almost the size of my natural coils--the hair seems to retain its natural pattern. Here's a pic of me wearing twisted bangs (Sorry about the poor pic quality. This was before I bought a digicam and was using an ancient webcam.):

Picture26-vi.jpg


Here's a close up of how the ends looked after a wash while airdrying. The hair is not untwisted. Each individual spiral you see is the end of a twist--the untwisted part that I previously pressed together (Forgive the quality of the pics again. Same lousy webcam is to blame):

Twistspirals-vi.jpg


That is the natural shape of my strands. You can tell that because they are interlocking the way springs might if you pressed them together so the follow the same pattern.

Below are pics I took during a different experiment before using my new digicam and you can see again, on the pic to the right showing untwisted hair, the interlocking of the wet strands like pen springs pressed together:
WetTwistWetTwistout-vi.jpg


Right now I'm wearing braided bangs w/o extensions. I twist the ends instead of braiding to the end and then just press the very tip and twist the entire section as explained above. I have tried to separate that end so you can see how the very tip that I don't manipulate with braiding looks. You can see the untouched tip forms circular spirals ie tiny curls:

enstylingfollowsnaturalpattern-vi.jpg


Anyway, let's go back to the section of zigzag hair I took out of a braid earlier in this post. I have just applied conditioner (Trader Joe's) to the dry hair and already you can see it going back to its "preferred" state, ie the state it would be in if I hadn't manipulated it and forced it into a braid shape. In the first pic below (top left) you can see my hair slowly responding to moisture from the conditioner and slowly reverting from the stretched zigzag state caused by braiding. In the lower pics, you see my hair fully reverted to its natural state:
ghwhenHairsDampwithConditioner-vi.jpg


After I rinsed out the conditioner, this is how it looked wet with its cute curved curls/coils becoming evident. No corners or zigzags here:
4BCurlsClearinWetNakedHair-vi.jpg


And below you see it when it is fairly dry.
kedHairShowsNaturalCurlPattern-vi.jpg

There's no denying baby curls in there, I don't care what anyone says. :lol: I see spirals, very tiny ones that I would hate to have to untangle if my whole head was in them--hence the reason I never wash my hair out of braids or twists, nor do I ever do wash- n-gos coz lawd knows my strands have mad love for each other and trying to get in between their heavy petting is asking for a long list of ailments (headaches, high blood pressure, stress.... :lachen: )

Here's a final pic of my 4B hair completely dry w/ no products.
4BHairCompletelyDryNoProducts-vi.jpg

Again, I see tiny curls and a uniform pattern in all the strands reminiscent of pen springs. :yep: In the pic on the left I was stretching it a bit like you would springs and going boing boing :lol: , and on the right, I've let go and it bounces back to lovely, soft, petite curls. :love:

(Hi I'm Nonie and I admit I'm insanely obsessed w/ my hair. :hide: )



So that's my story and I'm sticking to it: My 4B hair has curls/coils/spirals that are uniform all through. I am responsible for the times when they aren't evident because of my manipulating them when styling. :)

Nonie, your hair is gorgeous! :love:
 
To me, 4b does not mean no curl pattern... If your hair has no curl pattern, it's type 1 - straight...

I think this the distinction between 4a and 4b...

4a is defined tightly coiled and kinky hair.... strands of hair clump together to form little springs all over...

4b is undefined tightly coiled and kinky hair... the strands do not clump together, it's just a bunch of coily "fuzz" (not sure the right word for it). The strands may form a curvy "zigzag" pattern rather than defined coils/springs.
 
To me, 4b does not mean no curl pattern... If your hair has no curl pattern, it's type 1 - straight...

I think this the distinction between 4a and 4b...

4a is defined tightly coiled and kinky hair.... strands of hair clump together to form little springs all over...

4b is undefined tightly coiled and kinky hair... the strands do not clump together, it's just a bunch of coily "fuzz" (not sure the right word for it). The strands may form a curvy "zigzag" pattern rather than defined coils/springs.

That's my basic understanding of it at this point.

I just wonder how many people's hair CAN clump, but doesn't. And why one would clump more than the other.
 
To me, 4b does not mean no curl pattern... If your hair has no curl pattern, it's type 1 - straight...

I think this the distinction between 4a and 4b...

4a is defined tightly coiled and kinky hair.... strands of hair clump together to form little springs all over...

4b is undefined tightly coiled and kinky hair... the strands do not clump together, it's just a bunch of coily "fuzz" (not sure the right word for it). The strands may form a curvy "zigzag" pattern rather than defined coils/springs.

As much as we debate the intricacies of a system that we didn't invent and that doesn't make sense :lachen:, this is essentially the working definition of the 2.

That's my basic understanding of it at this point.

I just wonder how many people's hair CAN clump, but doesn't. And why one would clump more than the other.

I don't know, and I've asked it before but nobody seems to know. In fact, I assumed it was the irregularity and zigzaginess of the curl in 4b that prevented it from clumping.

In fact, now that I think about it, the ends of my hair can clump into coils, the last couple inches or so. The ends of my hair, being at the end and not weighed down by anything, are also the parts of the strands that have a more perfect coil shape. Is it coincidence? Probably not. Probably the more perfectly round the shape of the coil, the more likely it is to clump with other almost perfectly round coils. This is another reason to think that there is some kind of difference between the coil shape of "4a" and "4b", as imperfect as the distinction is. My hypothesis (made up in the last 5 seconds) is that for your hair to clump up the length of your strand, the coils have to be more uniform in shape.
 
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As much as we debate the intricacies of a system that we didn't invent and that doesn't make sense :lachen:, this is essentially the working definition of the 2.

:lachen: Right? It's interesting, but ultimately, can't apply to all heads consistently - it's just too narrow.

Also - I wonder how length/strand thickness works into this. As your hair gets longer, it's heavier, and even if when you had a TWA, you had tightly defined curls, by the time you get to BSL - if you have fine hair - they might be mostly waves - and if you have slightly coarser hair - they might still be curly. So even if I say, today, yeah, okay, maybe there are some coils in my hair, three months from now, my hair type might 'shift' so that it no longer looks the same.

:lachen:

This is like trying to create an accurate naming convention for skin tones.
 
:lachen: Right? It's interesting, but ultimately, can't apply to all heads consistently - it's just too narrow.

Also - I wonder how length/strand thickness works into this. As your hair gets longer, it's heavier, and even if when you had a TWA, you had tightly defined curls, by the time you get to BSL - if you have fine hair - they might be mostly waves - and if you have slightly coarser hair - they might still be curly. So even if I say, today, yeah, okay, maybe there are some coils in my hair, three months from now, my hair type might 'shift' so that it no longer looks the same.

:lachen:

This is like trying to create an accurate naming convention for skin tones.

True. Never thought of it that way :)
 
To me, 4b does not mean no curl pattern... If your hair has no curl pattern, it's type 1 - straight...

I think this the distinction between 4a and 4b...

4a is defined tightly coiled and kinky hair.... strands of hair clump together to form little springs all over...

4b is undefined tightly coiled and kinky hair... the strands do not clump together, it's just a bunch of coily "fuzz" (not sure the right word for it). The strands may form a curvy "zigzag" pattern rather than defined coils/springs.


Wow!! This thread has me sooooo confused....LOL!
But I THINK I have mostly 4a hair????
Even without product...my hair dries with "mostly" tight coils vs "fuzz"!

But everyone here is researching this subject like real hair scientists!!!
Can somebody "type" me please? Or at least give your opinion.

(see fotki for pics of dry unmanipulated hair--2006 albums. hmmm...in those albums my hair was dyed--so then, maybe that's not the "true texture"??? **sigh** But I have other pictures in the 2008 albums...but product is added in those pics.)

I think I have very very thick 4a to 4b hair! I think....:look:
 
Also - I wonder how length/strand thickness works into this. As your hair gets longer, it's heavier, and even if when you had a TWA, you had tightly defined curls, by the time you get to BSL - if you have fine hair - they might be mostly waves - and if you have slightly coarser hair - they might still be curly. So even if I say, today, yeah, okay, maybe there are some coils in my hair, three months from now, my hair type might 'shift' so that it no longer looks the same.

:lachen:

This is like trying to create an accurate naming convention for skin tones.

Yeah, I know, it's confusing. Add that to the thread fabulosity just started about which counts, wet or dry, and it's like. :spinning:

As for the skin tones, what, you don't already have distinct boxes for people to be in? I do, they are all named after foods, usually deserts or caffeinated drinks. I'm a mochachocolatte in winter and I get more boring and just become mocha in summer. My mother is a toasted caramel pecan pie and her father is a honey cinnamon. And I dare anyone to deny the scientific accuracy of my categories!



:lachen::lachen::lachen: I guess I'm one of the few, but I have fun talking about hair types. :grin: Shoot, this is the most fun thread I've been in for a looong time. It's got pictures, pseudo-science, everything you want in a thread! Who gave this thread 1 star? Party pooper!
 
As much as we debate the intricacies of a system that we didn't invent and that doesn't make sense :lachen:, this is essentially the working definition of the 2.



I don't know, and I've asked it before but nobody seems to know. In fact, I assumed it was the irregularity and zigzaginess of the curl in 4b that prevented it from clumping.

In fact, now that I think about it, the ends of my hair can clump into coils, the last couple inches or so. The ends of my hair, being at the end and not weighed down by anything, are also the parts of the strands that have a more perfect coil shape. Is it coincidence? Probably not. Probably the more perfectly round the shape of the coil, the more likely it is to clump with other almost perfectly round coils. This is another reason to think that there is some kind of difference between the coil shape of "4a" and "4b", as imperfect as the distinction is. My hypothesis (made up in the last 5 seconds) is that for your hair to clump up the length of your strand, the coils have to be more uniform in shape.
:lachen:LOL! I know! And I agree with you as well about our hair coiling mostly at the ends, especially if you have a lot of length.

:lachen: Right? It's interesting, but ultimately, can't apply to all heads consistently - it's just too narrow.

Also - I wonder how length/strand thickness works into this. As your hair gets longer, it's heavier, and even if when you had a TWA, you had tightly defined curls, by the time you get to BSL - if you have fine hair - they might be mostly waves - and if you have slightly coarser hair - they might still be curly. So even if I say, today, yeah, okay, maybe there are some coils in my hair, three months from now, my hair type might 'shift' so that it no longer looks the same.

:lachen:

This is like trying to create an accurate naming convention for skin tones.
I agree with this as well. It is too narrow. I have seen a lot of natural women with looser hair texture (loose coils) say that their hair is type 4a and I'm thinking to myself I thought mine was 4a... maybe I need to re-examine my hair or something.

And I don't know about more length = heavier hair. Maybe for some but not others? As my hair got longer, it didn't get heavier. My hair still shrinks to high heavens. The pattern hasn't loosen at all. And my hair is very very dense too. I think if my hair reached waist length when stretched, it would shrink to my ears after washing with no manipulation! :lachen:
Wow!! This thread has me sooooo confused....LOL!
But I THINK I have mostly 4a hair????
Even without product...my hair dries with "mostly" tight coils vs "fuzz"!

But everyone here is researching this subject like real hair scientists!!!
Can somebody "type" me please? Or at least give your opinion.

(see fotki for pics of dry unmanipulated hair--2006 albums. hmmm...in those albums my hair was dyed--so then, maybe that's not the "true texture"??? **sigh** But I have other pictures in the 2008 albums...but product is added in those pics.)

I think I have very very thick 4a to 4b hair! I think....:look:
:lol: I was just throwing out an idea of what I thought the difference was between 4a and 4b. I really don't know since I didn't come up with the hair typing system. Andre wasn't very specific when he came up with it. I feel like my hair is the same way, mostly 4a. Without any manipulation at all, my hair dries up in tiny tight little coils. There are undefined coils as well which I would categorize as 4b but who knows.
 
Thanks Flowerhair and Neith. :kiss:

I'm pretty smitten with it myself :giggle:, now if only I could sit on it already!

Thanks for posting all the pics! I got inexplicably excited, lol.

The big difference between 4a and 4b hair now is the clumping factor imo.

What makes hair clump?

Curls following the same pattern when pressed together or when interlocked will clump. It's the same clumping you see when Curlformers create uniform curls before they're separated. Each section out of a Curlformer has clumped hair coil because all the strands have been formed into the same shape and each coil "cups" the one next to it of the same size and shape. That's what 4B hair does too: identical strands stick together with neighboring ones that have the same shape and size
 
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