Tweakers' Asylum

Tweaks for systems, rooms and Do It Yourself (DIY) help. FAQ.

Return to Tweakers' Asylum


Message Sort: Post Order or Asylum Reverse Threaded

The fun of braiding....

206.24.101.31

Posted on March 26, 1999 at 11:29:28
SFDude


 
...your own speaker cables! DAMN it's hard on the fingers! But it's finally done and I put them into use last night, replacing the Nordost Flatlines (not the Super) I had been using. I didn't really do any critical listening as of yet but I didn't seem to be missing anything in terms immediately. More critical listening to come tonite...

Some added info: the cables are constructed as such.

I braided 3 twisted pairs together to form a length of 6 wires. I then took 3 sets of these braided wires and braided them again. This gives about 18 wires for the cable. What is the effective AWG of this length? I didn't go into the extra effort of braiding these 18 wire cables with 2 others to give 54 wires total per cable. What are the caveats of making the cable thicker with the extra braids? If the 54 wire cable combination will have a major effect on the inductance and capacitance of the wire, I guess I'll go back to braiding a few more weeks and perhaps in shorter length (about 5 feet instead of the 8 feet length I was constructing before).

FYI, I'm not using the Plenum cable as stated as this is only experimental purposes and doing this while watching the boob tube at nights, more like one full braid each night.

 

Hide full thread outline!
    ...
Re: The fun of braiding...., posted on March 26, 1999 at 19:01:21
ChrisVH


 
You have about 15 gauge cable with the 9 twisted pairs (18 wires). By braiding with 2 more "9 twisted pairs" you effectively bring the gauge equivalent down to 10 gauge. The way your cables are currently constructed, you might find the bass to be a bit shy. It is pretty important to have the Teflon insulated CAT 5 if you want to really have ultimate performance, though. You might want to try to shorten your existing lengths- try in your system for preliminary listening and then get some TEFLON CAT 5 before you do any more braiding. That's alot of work to have to do all over with the Teflon insulated cable! Good luck, and BTW- the numbing pain in your fingers will go away after a few days! :-)

 

Re: The fun of braiding...., posted on March 29, 1999 at 10:48:15
jam


 
I have a bunch of CAT 5 to experiment with. I tried braiding and wasn't satisfied with the end look of the product, too difficult for me to get the cable even looking. I tried an alternative that I thought looked much better. I have no idea how this affects the sound.

I took twelve pairs with all the jackets removed. I tied off all twelve ends on a piece of wood with six inches of spacing in between each pair. I taped the other end of the pairs to a metal spindle. I put the metal spindle in a drill. I took out the slack and slowly turned on the drill twisting all twelve pairs neatly together. I had a few knots that I had to back up and get out, in the end I was able to create a neatly twisted cable that stayed together. I plan to add some heatshrink as the cable wants to knot if you move it around too much.

 

Page processed in 0.018 seconds.