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In Reply to: RE: How to coat bare cu wire to prevent oxidation and... posted by Tweaker456 on April 19, 2014 at 16:16:45
If it is bare wire, and has been out of the wire drawing die for more than few minutes, it is already oxidized on the surface.
That said, if you mean to avoid heavy macro-corrosion effects, which can be deleterious, then certain things should be avoided.
Things to avoid:
Polyurethane spray-on plastic/finish. Polyurethane is not a good sounding dielectric. Any one seeking out magnet wire to use for DIY cables should look for nylon coated wires, or NOS magnet wire with true bug-based lacquer coating.
Spray paint of any material with colored solids or dye content.
Any kind of tubing will not prevent exposure to the air, and the potential for air pollution corrosion and other related corrosion issues.
Things you can use:
Clear acrylic spray
Clear nitrocellulose based lacquer spray or paint-on.
With the above, use the least amount and still be assured that the wire is fully coated.
Pure paraffin wax. However, this one is tricky and even more dangerous than the above to apply and work with, so I can't really recommend it.
Obviously, with the above listed coatings, take all necessary and recommended precautions and safety practices, e.g., follow the directions for the material.
Jon Risch
Follow Ups:
Jon, can you describe the difference in sound between poly,nylon and or nitrocellulose. If one painted on nitrcellulose would it end up pretty thin and even?? Do nitrocellulose and nylon have lower dielectric numbers?? Thanks, Tweaker
"Things to avoid:
Polyurethane spray-on plastic/finish. Polyurethane is not a good sounding dielectric. "
Do test this yourself as you may find like others that a thin coat of poly is not distinguishable from a thin coat of lacquer, nylon, acrylic, or other spray on coatings. It would be easy, cheap, and informative to test this yourself. We (a group of 5 others) already have...Let us know what you find.
try it! you know you want to!
Not a lot of time, so:
In my opinion, the acrylic sounds the least irritating, followed by the nitrocellulose, and then the nylon. The nylon isn't "bad" mind you, just not as clean and crisp as the other tw.
Some folks might prefer the sound of the nitrocellulose, but it depends a lot on the exact formula and the conditions under which it was applied.
High humidity seems to make all the sprays worse.
Jon Risch
i am using bare wire ends to connect to amps and speakers and was considering gold plating the copper ends to prevent oxidation .
did anybody try that ?
Id consider keeping them bare and using MG carbon assembly paste on your connectors. It will sound much better. Usually simpler is better. A connector is just another thing in the signal path. Others may disagree. Tweaker
I find a speaker cable connector can often sound better than a bare wire connection. The impression of better current delivery due to a well-designed connector interface tends to show that it may not always be just another thing in the signal path. That said, if simple stranded speaker wire is in use, there is no reason why one should not experiment with a bare wire connection vs. a connector unless the speaker cable will be removed from I/O binding posts for various reasons (such as cable swap-outs) other than every now and then cutting-off the oxidized strands, then stripping-off a length of insulation at the ends to allow a fresh conductor interface with undamaged/non-corroded wire. However, that kind of 'maintenance' is unpractical and relatively impossible when litz or multiple conductor quasi-litz cables are in use, which require proper termination. YMMV
I hope people will refrain from throwing tomatoes at me for saying this. But, one could very thinly tin the bare wires with wonder solder. I realize this is not optimal, but it may be preferable to repeatedly cleaning and/or re-stripping.
The Ultralink Flex-Pin is a speaker cable connector made of flexible gold plated copper braiding as an alternative to using bare wire or a rigid pin connector for spring loaded terminals. Monster Cable also makes a similar product.
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