Is every piecewise smooth manifold with orientable pieces orientable

differential-topologyorientation

Is every piecewise smooth manifold with orientable pieces orientable?

By a piecewise smooth manifold(-with-boundary) I mean a family of smooth manifolds-with-boundary which may or may not have some boundaries in common.

By an orientable piecewise smooth manifold I mean an orientation on every piece such that if pieces $M_1$ and $M_2$ have boundary (an "edge") $E$ in common, the two orientations induced on $E$ by both pieces are opposite to each other. This is to ensure that Stokes' theorem won't give any contribution along any common edges but only along the "true" boundary of the piecewise smooth manifold.

In case the general answer to my question is "no" and additional requirements would need to be imposed in order to answer it in the affirmative, I'd also be interested in these.

Best Answer

God, it's late and I really shouldn't have asked this question. There's an easy counterexample: Take the Möbius strip / a rectangle whose vertical sides are identified and carry out two vertical cuts, so that it becomes a piecewise smooth manifold with two pieces, each of which is going to be orientable.

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