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63.16.43.3
In Reply to: RE: Sorry for the confusion posted by Dawnrazor on August 01, 2007 at 20:59:39
Actually in the case of maggies, the thin wire used (aluminum, too!) is to increase resistance, otherwise the drivers will have very little resistance at all. But being that they are essentially purely resistive, they do demand a bit more current flow.
Stu
Follow Ups:
Yeah Stu.
And, aluminium gives more conductivity per weight than coppoer, so they can keep the mass of the driver down compared to using copper.
Yeah, EVERYONE says that they need current. But, I telling you that they sound better with the thin magwire which in effect reduces the current they can see AFAIK.
The current seems to travel fine through the tiny aluminium, why not thin copper??
Well, my observation has been based on different amps I have used with maggies over the years. I started off with an MG-1 moved to the 2's and eventually bought 3's.Single gauge solid core wire does have advantages. Not necessarily for current capability (I actually used magnet wire when the craze first started, about 1983 or thereabouts). Over the years I believe, and I have no measureable proof, that a solid core design, especially those of minimal stranding, retains the signal integrity better. If you examine the typical Monster Cable, the 11 gauge finely stranded design, it would seem to me that it would be very difficult to insure that all individual strands are identical in length. The slight difference in length, although miniscule, leads to a slightly 'blurred' presentation. I notice this effect with many multistranded designs. The very first Tara labs speaker cable design was essentially solid core Romex in execution and it's relative performance got me thinking on the subject.
Of course, YMMV.
In the case of Maggies, if you carefully examine the wiring, remember that the tweeter and woofer wires are running in parallel so the average wire gauge presented to the the amp is a bit larger. I may be wrong, but I seem to recall that the woofer panels had a section where the wires were doubled, but I do not recall how the ends were terminated.
In my early forays into the solid core wire use, I did notice that after long term listening, the thinner gaudge wires did become warm. Not seriously so, but an indication of the additional load itpresented to the amplifier. Of course sometimes a higher load can be more stable for the amplifier.
However, in switching to larger gauges, the problem is tonal balance shifts. For IC's, I like wire in the 20 to 24 AWG size. Larger and the sound seems to cut off a bit of top end.
This was confirmed in a converstaion I lucked upon with Bruce Brisson of MIT. This was very long ago when he was just breaking away from being a subsidiary of Monster Cable. We were discussing the three gauge wire construction of his design, and naturally the subject of how the signal will divide up on its own came up.
For those unfamiliar, MIT has one gauge, a thicker one in the center, for bass, an intermediary gauge wound around for midrange, and then a layer of fine gauge wrapped around the two for treble. His reply was that the signal waveform reflects off the surface of the wire and penetrates into the center to the other side. He sort of calculates the optimum gauge for various 'critical' frequencies and uses those. In fact, he informed me that it was all a compromise, because the optimum gauge for a 20 HZ signal would have been about 1/2 inch and not practical at all.
I believe the smaller gauges which seem to be preferable are in the critical midrange/lower treble region. Keeping in mind the explanation given by Brisson, it is interesting to look at the crop of ribbon designs which have proliferated since. If you want to try a very good sounding and relatively cheap ribbon, the Nordost Two flat is a good starter. It has a midrange purity which outclasses some of their more expensive designs. Also of interest is the Kimber SF 23 hook up wire, not a ribbon, but an oval with a 2 to 1 ratio of diameters, and it is a 23 gauge wire.
Good listening, and of course your opinions may vary.
Stu
Hey US,
The maggies do have a few double runs of wire, but they are not connected at different points. SO it is all one continous long wire:
http://www.integracoustics.com/MUG/MUG/tweaks/dawnrazor/stock.jpeg
I wouldn't know if the wires are getting hot. It hasn't been a problem. But maybe that is just on the baby maggies I have. Not sure I would hook up the 3 series that way.
I think there is some truth to the amps liking extra resistance in some situations, especially maggies.
Here is a pict of the wires: (ignore the text)
http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/MUG/messages/11/113361.html
Thanks for the kool info on the Mit stuff.
I will be looking into making thicker aggregates to see how they compare. It will be interesting to try something like the Mit approach.
For me the mag wire is great the images and mids are just great. Highs are detailed without being bright...it is weird. I love the very tight bass which the Maggies excell at especially with teh magwire, but I could see some people thinking that the bass might be thin or too overdamped for their tastes. That said, I have heard a lot of bass in my day that I would chacterize as slow and bloated, that everyone seemed to dig. But perhaps I can get a happy medium some day.
Thanks.
As fellow participants in the polarity battles, we've pretty much seen eye to eye (with the exception of the Mercurys). I didn't know you had Maggies. Couple of months ago, I visited an audio shop with a friend and listened to both the 20.1s and 3.6s. Figured I would be in polarity heaven 'cause the Mark Levinson gear we were listening to had polarity switches on BOTH the CD player and preamp. So I was astonished when I couldn't hear a bit of difference when switching polarity with either one of them. I figured that Maggies must NOT be polarity coherent, but you're using them. Any clues?
No, I don't use them anymore.In addition to DawnR's reply, the other factor compounding the issue is that if you watch a Magnepan panel while a signal is fed to it, you'll see a series of waveforms moving down the panel, very much a akin to whipping a long piece of string. There are positive and negative waveforms coming out simultaneously.
Weird, but true, as I used to test rewiring of the tweeter panels with a signal generator. It really freaked me out. The Maggies are not a push pull design like an electrostatic, dynamic speaker, or even like an Apogee or ET design. That would make hearing phase difficult although the ribbons make it easier. I can hear phase with a ribbon Maggie, but differences are, like you say, not very definitive as other designs.
Incidentally, I listen more to the Eastman recordings, being a former wind player, and that's primarily where I based my conclusions on the Mercs. Also my former high school band director went to Eastman at the times the recordings were made and was one of the feet in the West Point Symphony. He had interesting stories about the players as well as the recording set up. That was very beneficial to me in hearing if I could check the placement and layout of the ensembles, a least as a 'bogey' in the quest for a 'neutral' system.
Stu
I am not stu but most maggies have some of their drivers out of phase due to the type of crossover employed. I think it has to do with the use of 2nd order crossovers on the bass drivers.
So, yes you cant detect phase on them. Man did that srew me up for years until I figured out that the speakers don't allow you to hear it.
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