Boot, Breakout, Shroud, Sleeve: Ten Terms Defined

Why the words diverged

Each word was coined at a part, not across a catalogue. One manufacturer's own sheets show it. One is titled Bus Bar Insulating Shroud / Boot. Another, Heat Shrink Shroud, covers cable entry into a gland. A third, Tamper Proof End Seal, describes an end cap.

So the noun tells you very little and the dimension columns under it tell you everything. Every part here is catalogued as a diameter as supplied against a diameter after recovery.

That makes an unfamiliar sheet readable: those two columns come first. Headings vary, meaning does not. a and b head the harness boot charts, s and f the breakout charts, Supplied ID and Recovered ID the gland chart.

The ten words, and the part each names

Crutch: The point inside a multi-core cable where the sheath ends and the cores separate. It is not an interface between two components, which is why the breakout range is catalogued for it and no boot is.
Branch-out: The manufacturer's word for a fork, used for two different forks. One sheet reads "two-way cable harness branch-out sealing". Another reads "sealing the branch-out (crutch) point". The core count settles which you have.
Breakout: One mouth, two to seven legs, closing over the fork and gripping each core separately. Catalogued 2 to 7 core to 3.3 kV, hot-melt lined, IP68 once installed. Rows sit at breakout size chart.
Boot: A moulded part working at one interface, with an entry and an exit: a connector, a bushing, a bar take-off. It never sits inside a cable. Families are indexed on heat shrink boots.
Shroud: Three unrelated parts carry this word. The GHSS cable-entry shroud runs GMW 22/6 to GMW 95/25, a GMW 30/8 reading 30mm supplied against 8mm free recovered. Busboot is a removable insulating shroud for busbar connections to 36 kV. The reusable insulating boot is a silicone/rubber one.
Sleeve: Covering along a length rather than a fitting at a point, so it is sized on the run and not on an outlet count. The cold shrink text uses it a third way, for the recovering body.
Gland: A fitting that seals and mechanically retains a cable entering an enclosure. The heat-shrinkable GHSG is a nylon nut, an O-ring and a moulded shrink part, rated to 600 volts and 25 psi. A GHSG-3 reads 29mm supplied ID against 12.5mm recovered ID. No boot here retains anything.
End cap: A closed cap over a cut cable end, sealing rather than branching. The GEC range starts at 6mm supplied against 2mm recovered. Caps sit with Open End, a sister reference published by the same publisher as this site.
End seal: Two parts with nothing in common. The Tamper Proof End Seal is an end cap on the same GEC codes, published as permanent and not re-usable. The Elastomeric End Seal is a rubber process seal for a cable curing line.
Branch-off clip: A moulded clip, GBOC 1 to GBOC 3, holding two cores apart in the fork while an outer sleeve recovers over them. Its hot melt lining melts with that shrinkage, so without the sleeve it is not a seal. Manufacturer's page: Branch Off Clip.

Where the sources disagree with themselves

Shroud is the worst of these. On the sheets behind this site it names a cable-entry part, a removable busbar cover to 36 kV, and the body of a reusable termination boot. One sheet settles nothing by titling itself Bus Bar Insulating Shroud / Boot. A shroud enquiry with no diameter pair cannot be answered as written.

The measurement and geometry words

As supplied, and after free recovery: The two states every chart quotes. As supplied is the part in the box. Free recovery is the diameter it reaches with nothing inside to stop it. The change runs one way, so anything measured off a recovered part is a b figure and will not match a catalogue a figure.
a and b: a is the as-supplied figure and a minimum. b is the recovered figure and a maximum. A GHS2-N-1218 reads 39mm against 18mm on its body; a GHYB-381-1 reads 19.80mm against 6.60mm at H. Replacing a boot with no part number starts from b.
s and f: The same pair under different letters on the breakout and shroud charts. Ds is the supplied internal diameter and a minimum, Df the free-recovered one and a maximum.
Range-taking: The published word for the band between the two figures, and the reason one code serves several cable diameters. It is a listed feature on the reusable insulating boot, whose band is 46 to 70mm of bushing.
Lipped: A catalogue variant, not a description. Separate lipped sheets exist for the straight and the right angle geometry, each with its own chart. The lip is drawn and never described, so the word settles no dimension.
Right angle, straight, Y: GHRB turns the cable through 90 degrees, GHSB leaves it in line, GHYB splits one entry into two. The codes differ by a letter and so do the figures: GHRB-111 reads 25.70mm against 10.50mm at H, GHSB-111 25.60mm against 10.30mm.
Outlet count against core count: An outlet is a leg leaving a boot on a harness: 2 on GHS2-N, 3 on GHS3-N. A core count belongs to the cable, 2 to 7 on the low-voltage breakout. The phrase welding the two names no part.
Transition: On these sheets a transition joint joins two cable constructions: the GTJ series, PILC to XLPE up to 36 kV. The trade also uses the word for any point where a cable meets something else. Only the first carries a code.

Anti-tracking, non-tracking, semi-conductive

Three material words read as near-synonyms. Two are one thing here. The third is seven orders of magnitude away and does the opposite job.

Word	What the material is for	Volume resistivity	Test method
Standard insulating	The low-voltage crutch breakout, 2 to 7 core to 3.3 kV. No tracking figure is published for it.	1 × 10¹⁴ ohm.cm min	ASTM D257
Anti-tracking, and non-tracking	One family, two names: the page is headed Anti-Tracking and its own summary says Non-Tracking. 3-core PVC and PILC to 36 kV.	1 × 10¹⁴ ohm.cm min	ASTM D257
Semi-conductive	Rebuilds the screen belted PILC does not carry on its cores, while sealing the crutch. Not an insulating material.	1 × 10⁷ ohm.cm min	ASTM D257

Words this site cannot define from a published sheet

Bottle and low profile appear in none of the manufacturer sheets behind this network, so no dimension follows from either. Nor is a T boot catalogued: 2-way and 3-way are the published outlet counts. Where a supplier uses those words, the diameter pair still settles fit.

Named on this page, not covered on this site

The word is settled. The size is not.

Both charts run row by row, a figure beside b figure, with the letters left as the manufacturer prints them.

Boot size chart Breakout size chart