yeah, after spending some time at work looking at materials, it seems to be an electrical conduit. mcmaster seemed to have the best selection, but they only had that one that might work, but it still doesn't look like it would bend enough. i was going to send one of my crappier cords down to maintenance to see what they thought, but that'll have to wait for tuesday.
thanks for the preliminary info guys, i hope to nail this one down to a specific product though, for us lightgun hackers.