Internal cabling on the 25t

[pre65]

IFany cable sheath material was found to impede electron flow in the wire (s) it enclosed then it should be more widely known. I'd be interested to read any papers on the subject.

The fact that so many different cables can "make a difference" infers that there are possibly several things at play at the same time ?

[Black Stuart]

Amazing,
I posted a complete explanation yesterday that has either been deleted or simply disappeared.

pre 65's post seems to imply that it did appear in this thread - TechFlex is incredibly microphonic, especially when used for h/phone cable.

I had a look yesterday on ebay.com (USA) and the soft 'audio' TechFlex seems to have disappeared. However from China I see they are making a cotton version which should be just as good.

Has pre 65 confused 'sheathing material' with dialectric?

[bob orbell]

Hmm, yes I was on yesterday awaiting your reply Stuart, but you logged off and no post apeared, . BOB

[Black Stuart]

Bob - bugger, I did'nt log off and it was a long post going into detail.

Let's try again - most i/cs are made using traditional thinking which simply doesn't stand up to critical reason and investigation.

I spent 4 years, starting from scratch to make i/cs that would carry the musical/electron signal with the least interference.

I started using basically traditional methods and materials and found that there was little improvement .Trying to save on costs by using inferior/cheaper return wiring was a waste of time.

Conductors that had tightly wrapped dialectric served only to constrict the signal. I used to some good effect CT100 & CT125 TV, SAT cable. I removed the centre copper conductor and used that and the surrounding cellular structure for Pos. and Return wires.

It was at this point that I started to use multiple conductors but only for the signal, this was wrong. Once I began using the same number of conductors for both functions, an uplift in quality was observed, I learned here that balance is everything.

Using single conductors to mimic the collective gauge of multiple conductors did'nt work - this is where it would be good to obtain the help of a technical college or university to explain why. With proper research facilities - signal strength could be measured at point (A) input and point (B) output.

TBC in second post.

[Black Stuart]

Part 2:

Stranded wire is fine for power cables but again Heaviside's findings on conduction show clearly that for signal transfer they most definitely are'nt.

With that in mind has anyone tried using solid core for tonearm wiring instead of Litz? Not only is the gimbal arm on the Kenwood KD series very good but back then Kenwood used solid core silver.

Twisting cables because of imaginary interference - if power cables are properly shielded and they should be then there can be only one reason for this - it means that sheathing of cables isn't nec. ergo quicker production = less material cost and more profit.

It seems that TechFlex has stopped production of the soft expandable tubing/sheathing material, no matter, the Chinese sell soft cotton sheathing. The old hard TechFlex is really microphonic, especially with h/phone cables. I used to use it before I knew better.

If CT 100 & CT 125 used TEFLON or far better FEP then this TV/SAT cable would be very good indeed, especially if they added another couple of cells to the structure - no need for sheathing and i/cs could be made very quickly.

The only RCAs I use are Puresonic. I used the Gap type but the Balanced are perfect.They used to use plastic bodies but now use aluminium or carbon fibre - why, plastic has minimal effect on signal transfer and it's cheaper to use and cheaper to post! They can be soldered and desoldered and used many times for experiments unlike the useless and expensive Eichmans. The Balanced I think (I havn't used them yet) will give a superior performance because as the name suggest - they use the same amount of metal for signal and return, balance, the all important point. They are so easy to solder unlike a lot of not so cheap types which use the shell for the return and can be a real b#~'@r to get enough heat to solder.

TEFLON/PTFE is often touted as the best dialectric - it isn't, another flueroplastic is - FEP. Use the same plugs and conductor/s but use TEFLON for one and FEP for another set and you can hear the difference, as always androids can't, everything sounds the same to them. It's weird but TEFLON has a milky colour and FEP is clear with a hint of blue.

[Black Stuart]

So, here it is:

Use high purity solid core wire, I found 26AWG to be the best but if you want to experiment around this gauge do so, you may find differently. Silver/plated OFHC copper is good, the minimum of microns is best or you are listening to a silver conductor. I found the quality I was looking for from MWS in California ( the postage is killing). This wire gives a neutral sound.

High purity silver, solid core of course will yield a detailed but slighty warm sound which most people prefer.

I found that 4 x conductors both signal and return yielded the best sound v material and construction, apparently 7 x is even better but that's a lot of material to use and complexity to make.

Dialectric - oversized FEP tubing I used ID (inside diameter) 1.43 / OD (outside diameter) 1.65 / wall thickness 0.15 or you could use tubing same ID with a wall of 0.30mm. This using 26AWG wire

Use soft sheathing to contain the straight wire runs.

Never ever use the grub screws that come with most RCA plugs - use 3-1 shrink tubing. You may need to use two diameters of tubing to effectively 'grip' the sheathed wires, it depends on the plugs you use. It is not easy and without a properly designed jig to hold everything in place a second pair of hands at the critical moment will make life a lot easier. If I can find an engineer with an open mind to make such a jig I may go back to marketing them.

If you make a set try them with a CDP, you will have a different opinion of the sound. I replicate this wiring inside my amps both head and power for signal wiring - this really brought the smile back to my jaded face. 4 years of llistening to sound and not music - happy days. Do not make any attempt to route the wiring around the perimeter of the amp - straight line from entry to pot. You can use any material in thin strips glued at intervals to keep these signal wires together inside the amp.

As a thankyou to an American friend who did me a lot of favours and saved me a lot of money on an AT 33EV cartridge and a Hakko soldering station I sent him a 0.5M set of the silver i/cs. He emailed me when he got them - 'no need to have done that Stuart, I'm happy with my Zen Reference. half an hour later another email ' these are rather good'. An hour later 'hell man I think I prefer yours and I got the Zens @ $600 trade'.

[Black Stuart]

If your looking for easy - ignore. If you can't let go of received wisdom - ignore. I have only one type of conductor left to try and I have a gut feeling it will yield the best sound - bare 6N copper. Oxidisation is the problem, the possible solution - Pro-Gold, applied with a swab at point of construction. the highest risk of oxidisation will be at either end, so I plan to make the trial set a little longer. in the future I will check for oxidisation and can trim back if this is so. The risk is that the application of Pro-Gold will interfere with the electrons travelling on and around the surface of the conductors.

I plan to make a h/phone cable for my 600/650 cans using this design. The Cardas plugs I tried in the past were completely useless, I've got another type coming from China and they also produce a type with a metal shell. I need to buy some more FEP tubing as a 1M cable uses 8M, so I need 12M. If anyone wants to try their hand I can add it to my order - purchase price plus postage on a small reel I have spare, or buy yourself from www.adtech.co.uk I also have a few new sets of the Puresonic Gap RCA plugs, I got them cheap on Ebay - £15 plus postage (just checked and these have brass bodies - bad memory, or buy yourself from Puresonic direct.

[Chris]

Lots of good info Stuart, I also prefer multi strand cables after trying an American brand called Morrow Cables, I have also some solid silver strands in oversized clear tubes which seem to be abound now on Ebay. There are some single core cable that some serious diy builders are using like Mundorf Silver and Gold and Duelund silver foil in oil, both very expensive.
The best thing to do is read lots and experiment even more to find the perfect match for your ears. Silver is very revealing and so if there is are imperfections upstream then this will be heard even more then copper, that's my take on it..
There could also be different levels of pureness in the metals so a copper cable could sound better then a slightly less pure Silver one, the more pure a metal is the more costly it is to produce, 9999's compared to 99999's in pureness is there an audio difference?

Chris..

[Black Stuart]

Chris,
cheap conductors, copper or silver have lots of impurities - it's all about electron flows. The statement that - air is the best dialectric holds true but still commecial and diy i/cs are made using wrapped wires.

Do try using FEP instead of TEFLON as dialectric. The 6N solid core copper should be interesting.

[hal55]

Madisound are building the crossovers and have suggested Supra cable (they stock it) which is a 5nines OFC cable with a tin plating. Wasn't sure about the tin, but apparently its there for a valid reason. They've asked if I want 12 or15 awg. Doubt it really matters but I would have assumed thinner would be marginally better, right , wrong or no difference at all? Just curious what the consensual is here, given the very small lead in wires on the seas drivers themselves going bigger just seems overkill, but I respect opinion here so curious what you think. Personally, I've never gotten on that well with silver cables, so happy to use copper/tin rather than copper,/silver or just silver.