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I have a tough time understanding why some of you don't anticipate an improvement when using a silver plated outlet as opposed to a brass one giving that there is a very substantial improvement in conductivity... The improvement is NOT a subtle one in my experiance.Tim
Follow Ups:
Tim, if we look at an outlet as the equivalent of a relay contact that is continually closed, we find that no good relay uses brass on brass contacts. Why? Because silver is a better contact material. Above 2 A or so, silver is often used as a contact plating material, even though the bulk of the contact might be brass, copper, etc. You should look into relay contacts and to why they are made with special platings, to understand what is best. There are many books written on this subject.
Thank you John...Your work is an inspiration to some.. including me.
Any particular publications that would enlucidate me on this subject?
Tim
Tim, the best way to learn is to search the web yourself. I just did, on relay contacts, and I got stuff that even I didn't have on hand. Still, let's look at reality. Brass on brass works well enough for most applications. It will not burn down your house over time, and it is fairly rugged and flexible. So is a jeep. ;-)
If you want better performance, then you have to pay more AND even have tradeoffs that might not work as well with every lightbulb, heater, motor, etc. What counts, in this case, is performance for the application, over a reasonable period of time. Personally, I would check and clean silver contacts after a few months, because they will grab sulfur from the air and coat with silver sulfiide, [not silver oxide] This is not so good and it will compromise the connection. Silver polish will remove the sulfide.
Thanks again John!Tim
nt
I have a tough time understanding why some of you don't anticipate an improvement when using a silver plated outlet as opposed to a brass one giving that there is a very substantial improvement in conductivity...The silver plating does nothing to change the conductivity of the underlying metal. All else being equal, the higher conductivity of the silver plating would simply give you a bit lower contact resistance versus brass. But the contact resistance of a good brass connection is so low as to be of no real consequence.
se
So tell me Steve... if you have two equal lengths of wire - one of brass, the other silver-plated brass, which will exibit the lower resistance?Tim
So tell me Steve... if you have two equal lengths of wire - one of brass, the other silver-plated brass, which will exibit the lower resistance?The plated wire. But I don't think you quite comprehend how insignificant this would be. In a later post you wrote:
The point is.. current always favors the path of least resistance in the case the plated surface of the connector.
You presuppose that the plated surface is a path of least resistance. Simply because silver may have a higher conductivity than brass doesn't mean that the silver plating on a brass wire will represent the path of least resistance.
For a given type of wire, its resistance per unit length is determined by its cross sectional area. The greater its cross sectional area, the lower its resistance and vice versa. So you can't consider just the conductivity of the silver, but also its cross sectional area compared to the underlying metal.
Consider a 12 gauge, circular wire which has a diameter of 0.0808 inches. And that this is the diameter after it has been generously plated with 5 micrometers of silver.
So, the cross sectional area of the entire wire is 0.0051276 square inches. Subtracting the thickness of the silver plating, the cross sectional area of the underlying wire is 0.0050778 square inches. Subtract the latter from the former and the cross sectional area of the silver plating itself is 0.0000498 square inches.
If you made a circular wire with the same cross sectional area as the silver plating, it would have a diameter of 0.00797 inches. To give a sense of scale to this, I pulled up AutoCAD and drew the two diameters exactly to scale.
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While the electrical resistivity of silver is about four times lower than brass, the cross sectional area of the brass in this example is about 100 times greater than the silver. So the silver's contribution to lowering the resistance of the wire is quite minimal. If the wire were copper rather than brass, its contribution would be considerably less still as silver is only marginally more conductive than copper.
Why so obsessed about such minscule amounts of resistance?
se
Thanks Steve... I appreciate the viewpoint and agree in general.... but the contribution of the silver in lowering resistance is not directly proportional to the cross sectional area....esp. in the case of a brass piece in can be substantial.Tim
Thanks Steve... I appreciate the viewpoint and agree in general.... but the contribution of the silver in lowering resistance is not directly proportional to the cross sectional area....esp. in the case of a brass piece in can be substantial.I didn't say that its cross sectional area was solely responsible. I also made mention of silver's higher conductivity versus brass. But I also put it into perspective by saying that while silver is about 4 times more conductive than brass, the cross sectional area of the brass in the example I gave is 100 times greater than the cross sectional area of the silver. That 4 time increase in conductivity doesn't come close to making up for the 100 time decrease in cross sectional area versus the brass.
se
An outlet is not a length of wire. It's 'length' is so short that the higher conductivity of the silver is not significant in that way. It is however probably significant as contact resistance.
The point is.. current always favors the path of least resistance in the case the plated surface of the connector.Tim
***current always favors the path of least resistance in the case the plated surface of the connector.If you looked at the current distribution through the conductor cross-section, you would see plenty of current going through the brass body.
The current doesn't just flow through the silver layer in this example. It flows through the whole things. That silver layer may be thin enough to be completely inconsequential.
Agreed... The layer must be of sufficient thickness to have appreciable affect. In fact I regularly "shop" for surplus silver plated copper wire.. and routinly use a razor to check the thickness of the plate... in my experiance the thicker the plate the better the wire... I have also developed a disticnt preference for a very thin teflon dielectric.Tim
The layer must be of sufficient thickness to have appreciable affect.Rather tough for silver plate over copper to have an appreciable effect (in terms of resistance) given that silver's resistivity is only marginally greater than that of copper. 1.63 vs. 1.694 respectively.
Still don't see what the obsession over resistance is all about.
se
So you agree that for outlets, most of the current is conducted in the brass?
This is true, but IMO to really get what's going on, you should take an outlet apart and see how a plug makes contact with it. Hold it up to a light. You will probably be a bit surprised at how poorly the plug prongs contact the outlet brass, even for tight-feeling outlets. The outlet contacts are quite crudely formed, contact the plug over a very small non-flat area. The silver plating helps fill the gaps, it's softer than the brass, gives a larger contact area. It's cheap and has high conductivity, and silver is exceptionally easy to plate and in a controlled manner.(I should send you one of my aborted 5242 outlets if you don't have one to take apart. This is something you have to see to appreciate what the plating is physically/mechanically doing, don't even have to hear it if you don't want to.)
To answer your question I want you to picture a moutain river with a flat spot 1 ft deep across the center and extending near the banks... but near the banks you have a narrow channel 4 ft deep on both sides.... where is the water moving faster?..... the silver allows a considerable amount of the current to take the "fast track".....Tim
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...negative Gs. Electrons love negative Gs. Gives them little ticklies in their tummies (except for the stupid ones who stuff themselves at the snack bar and end up blowin' quarks). And as everyone knows, a happy electron is a good sounding electron. Trust me on this one. :-)se
Ha Ha.... Great post Steve.... I love this forum... You guys introduce all kinds of stimuli to the thought process.........
BTW.. in my system all of the wire etc. is either silver or spc teflon from the box to the components.. no hookupwire either axial leads only.Tim
Doesn't silver tarnish easily (quickly)? It makes more sense to take a good brass plug/outlet and nickel plate to reduce the effects of tarnishing. Hasn't this been hashed out years ago with binding posts?
Actually no... Silveroxide is a better conductor than either nickel or brass.
Nickel plate is very close to stainless steel in composition. Do you think that makes a good conductor?
I didn't think the criteria for plating material was low conductance. Why did you chose silver for Acme outlets?steve
Both nickel and stainless are poor conductors... You may find this table interesting:
http://www.amm.com/ref/conduct.HTMTim
Tarnishing almost doesn't matter, as any well-designed contact pair will exhibit strong wiping action on engagement, removing any oxide as you slide them. So unless you have an extremely strong deposit of dirt and oxide, the top film will always be removed resulting in a clean metal-to-metal connection. Given high pressure usually found in good outlets, there is no film what will stand the scraping action.
***I have a tough time understanding why some of you don't anticipate an improvement when using a silver plated outlet as opposed to a brass one giving that there is a very substantial improvement in conductivity...Well... here is a challenge for you. Take an average system consisting of say, thirty feet of Romex, then the outlet, then the plug, then, say, a 7 foot 14 guage power cord. Measure its resistance with a silver plated outlet and then with a standard brass one.
If you indeed can spot that "substantial improvement in conductivity" then I'll buy you a case of Sam Smith's.
A question to ponder... if you just take a good quality outlet-plug pair, made of brass, and then plate it with silver - do you reduce the overal inserted resistance or increase it?
This has nothing to do with CONTACTS. it is a false assumption. PLEASE, read a book on the subject.
Please read the post.
What's with that?! Trying to help us save money by avoiding extra plating!?Ok. To be serious, I fully agree with your logic. Silver plating would act like a series resistance to the contact. And since silver is not some crazy negative resistance, it could only add to total contact resistance and leave you with a worse connection. I've never been a fan of silver plating to begin with, and this only pushes me further away.
Thanks for that eye opening, forehead smacking perspective.
Andy
< < Silver plating would act like a series resistance to the contact.Where'd you get that erroneous idea? It's as valid as saying a proper solder joint is just a lump of tin and lead sitting on some conductors.
But, IMO from my experiments and experience, down with nickel plating.
nt
Well, a proper solder joint makes a chemical bond between the conductors, and has a lower resistance than the 2 conductors twisted together, say, and can be lower than a cold weld. The key word here is proper. Whether you like the sound better is another matter. Likewise with silver-plated outlets. It is well-known that for engineering purposes silver/gold plating can create better contact, depending on the circumstance. This is measurable, unlike airy fairy comments about sound quality. That's why it's done, not for decoration. Again, whether you prefer the sound of it is a different matter. Frankly, I'm silver-plating outlets/plugs for my amusement because I had the gear (for another hobby), and though I'm not much a fan of silver IC's/cables in general, the effect in the power circuit is more subtle and more to my taste. Maybe I ought to pass some of the 5242 outlets I've plated around to see what people think, and if they like it they could get a proper ACME one.
Send me one. I'll listen. I kave been comparing stan. 15A, 20A, and HG for a couple months. If it's better, I'll gladly pay for it.
They're not for sale; I was more thinking of people passing around among themselves, just to get a feel.Here's what I've been doing. I plate standard .999 silver usually, but IMO plating using a Sterling or a .900 silver old U.S. half-dollar or even .800 old Can. silver as an anode works just as well sonically (easier to get than more small silver bars around here). Just had to try it, because I was eating up silver quite rapidly by plating the whole damn outlets, every bit of metal including all the ground frame, just because it's easier for me. This easily uses more than 100X the silver just plating the plug contact areas would, and is pointless re. benefit. See my above post re. plating materials and what they're doing, so anything "softish" but durable and a good conductor is better than an air (or spark) gap between mating surfaces. Nickel plating is too hard IMO, for one thing; mating surfaces are as inflexible/hard(er) as the brass ones. Gold is a bit of a pain to plate on brass (can't do it directly myself), and is too soft (get's worn/scratched too easily, defeating purpose).
Very Interesting... I too am working with plating..... Thanks for your observationsTim
and good luck to you... (Plating is much easier and untedious than most people would think...). I was initially reluctant to talk about this stuff because it's a little bit off the beaten path here, and deals with chemicals (allegedly not too worrisome health-wise), but it's DIY one level deeper... Please e-mail me your ideas, because the Plating-People I've had contact with are not of the audio domain.
Well... here is a challenge for you. Take an average system consisting of say, thirty feet of Romex, then the outlet, then the plug, then, say, a 7 foot 14 guage power cord. Measure its resistance with a silver plated outlet and then with a standard brass one.Yes. That alone will illustrate just how insignificant the contact resistance of a brass outlet versus a silver plated outlet is in relation to the big picture. But if you really want to do it right, you need to measure the resistance of the entire loop, which begins and ends way back at the secondary winding of the power transformer on the utility pole.
se
This idea still stymies me. How on earth (no pun intended) could a better outlet make any difference at all, unless using it lowers overall power transfer impedance? Is the problem related to the fact that we're all talking resistance instead of impedance?If you look at the entire circuit from the pole to your equipment, all that I can see that you could possibly do are a) lower the overall power transfer impedance, or b) act as some sort of energy storage device (like a cap).
Am I missing something?
Shawn Harvey
Yeah, mine does too. I still think that everything connected to a device designed to reproduce sound using electricity will be affected by all of the components that make up that device. How much of an effect is the key here. Can the effects be measured or heard?
If you look at the problem from one aspect (conductivity) then you're only observing the experiment from one viewpoint. Our senses may be flawed to some degree but they've also kept us alive for quite a while. I wouldn't discount them completely. Especially since the whole point of all of this is to LISTEN with our own ears.
Rob CThe world was made for people not cursed with self-awareness
OK Victor I will bite:"Well... here is a challenge for you. Take an average system consisting of say, thirty feet of Romex, then the outlet, then the plug, then, say, a 7 foot 14 guage power cord. Measure its resistance with a silver plated outlet and then with a standard brass one"
We are considering.. not the resistance of the entire path from box to component.... but just the outlet itself... You cloud the issue.
"A question to ponder... if you just take a good quality outlet-plug pair, made of brass, and then plate it with silver - do you reduce the overal inserted resistance or increase it?"
If both are dip-plated you reduce... substantialy.
Tim
***We are considering.. not the resistance of the entire path from box to component.... but just the outlet itself... You cloud the issue.I don't think so at all. All those impedances are in series, so you are looking at the sum total.
"A question to ponder... if you just take a good quality outlet-plug pair, made of brass, and then plate it with silver - do you reduce the overal inserted resistance or increase it?"***If both are dip-plated you reduce... substantialy.
OK, let's check this logic. Let's say we have two brass bodies in intimate contact. The oxide was removed through the wiping action, so we have a gas tight contact brass-brass.
Say, now we plate them, and you say we reduce the impedance. OK, how about then inserting a 1km long piece of silver in between, fused to brass pieces on both ends? Does it make it even lower?
***If both are dip-plated you reduce... substantialy.OK, let's check this logic. Let's say we have two brass bodies in intimate contact. The oxide was removed through the wiping action, so we have a gas tight contact brass-brass.
Say, now we plate them, and you say we reduce the impedance. OK, how about then inserting a 1km long piece of silver in between, fused to brass pieces on both ends? Does it make it even lower?
Let me see if I'm understanding the point you're trying to make here. You're essentially saying that the plating effectively increases the conductive path length which would have the effect of increasing resistance. Am I on the right track here?
se
.
...then something's being left out of the equation. The plating is not just increasing the path length for the current, but it's also increasing the volume of the conductors. And assuming the plating is of a uniform thickness, the conductors' volume will increase by a factor greater than the increase in its length.So even if you were plating the brass conductor with just more brass, let alone silver, its resistance would decrease.
se
Depends on the ratio of the surface contact area to the cross section of the bulk of the material.Imagine a very small contact if the centre of the end of a large thick plated bar. The profile of the current will not be uniform at the end of the bar. Those little electrons are going to take the 'shortest' route electrically and that will mean they will bunch together all trying to get to the small contact point, and hence they will find themselves in copper. If it's brass, same thing, will happen, but more will stay out near the silver, but it's on;y a factor of 4, so very near the enad, the same thing will start happening as the path lengths get to that ratio.
> The oxide was removed through the wiping action, so we have a gas tight contact brass-brass.Do we really have a gas tight connection? That may be a flawed assumption. Do we really know that all the oxides were actually removed from the contact points?
The ability to create a good gas tight connection may be what helps separate good outlets from lesser ones. Also, an outlet that's recently been silver-plated may also have less oxide build-up from one that's been sitting on a shelf for months. Don't know how much of a difference that makes, but that's something to think about.
***Do we really have a gas tight connection? That may be a flawed assumption.In that hypothetical case we do. Given pretty stiff springs on good outlets this is not a bad assumption in reality either. Of course there are some outlets where the pressure is quite low.
***Do we really know that all the oxides were actually removed from the contact points?***The ability to create a good gas tight connection may be what helps separate good outlets from lesser ones.
I agree.
***Also, an outlet that's recently been silver-plated may also have less oxide build-up from one that's been sitting on a shelf for months. Don't know how much of a difference that makes, but that's something to think about.
All that is true, but this discussion is moving away from the original question - that of a substantial improvement in conductivity at the system level.
Much of the resistance in the AC power system is caused by contacts. Improving these contacts significantly should then decrease the system resistance by a significant amount at high current draw. The silver/silver contact is very good, better than brass/brass. First, silver is too soft for use as an entire conductor. But on the nice strong brass, a plating makes a slightly softer layer of metal to mate with, and hence they physically combine better. Add to this the terrible conductivity of oxidized brass, as opposed to silver oxide, and we see that points at the edges of the contact, where the blades have not scraped clean, bust still have a light contact become part of the contact area. A small effect, clearly, but with silver it does increase the effective contact area very slightly. Also, the silver is just plain higher conductivity, making for lower resistance at a equal sized contact, and the resistance between silver and brass layers is too small to be relevant, considering how well silver plating takes to brass, and the huge area through which current can flow-this being the whole connector blade, rather than just the small wipe area which gets used. And as long as I'm talking minor effects, it does make the metal thicker, which should result in better overall conductivity and a tighter contact, as with no inserted plug the open area between wipes is reduced, and has the same mechanical strength, so will "grab" better.
I have, and will continue to use silver plating on AC connectors, and find that even plating just the plug when mating with a brass outlet still makes an audible improvement.
All Victor asked was what is the total effective reduction in resistance taking all the elements between the transformer on the pole to the component transformer due to the silver plating?steve
was that connections are a main part of resistance in the AC power, and describing why the silver would work better. It was long because it's a lot of little things, and though at low current, it's no biggie, at high current, such as a 230 WPC biamped system with multiple sources such as mine , it is appreciable, likely due to the seemingly slight lowering of resistance.
could the power supply of our preamps and amps be in the signal path? I have had major changes in my system by changing outlets and power cords.
Any decent system will have heaps of bypassing in the power supply. I am referring to the filter caps. These may in turn be further bypassed by further caps. What you have is the power supply (the mains supply, transformer, rectifier, regulator, whatever, being bypassed by a virtual short circuit - the filter caps. Now, tell me how you can change anything, by altering a relatively large impedance that is short circuited?
So, what you are saying is it in not possible for power cords and outlets to significantly infuluence the overall sound of the component. Is this correct Preamp?
It's all very well laying out money on expensive power cords, (these are free countries, thank God), but should we not be using large capacitors to by-pass the ceramic and glass insulators on overhead power-transmission cables? And what about the sonic advantages of three-phase versus single phase? We must consider all of these in the quest for audio perfection. And DC mains... should we demand their return?
Mike,If someone conducted a listening test to show whether two good quality outlets sounded different would be a more useful usefull place to start.
steve
I am saying it should be possible to design a system that will not be effected by external changes. I have heard it said that some tweaks may work best on systems that are not super high-end, in other words, that have some shortcomings. One place may be in the quality of the power supply.All that said, I am extremely dubious as to whether outlets are a significant tweak in this regard. The difference that one may find due to the outlet quality seems to be swamped by so many other things.
However, if anyone cares to present scientific results from properly conducted testing, I will then be convinced.
If you shoder the ac cord directly to the Romex, by your argument you could hear no improvement. Do you really believe that?
Note - I didn't say anything about the "improvement". As a friend of mine loves to say - his system sounds better with a turnip under his pillow, so who am I to dispute that?My point was about some significant improvement in conductivity.
I am about to set up a new listening room and have been wondering whether I should try, say, an ACME outlet. The concern I have is: My system sounds great but is, at best, entry-level high end at this point (vintage Marantz 2230 receiver, Rega P3 turntable, inexpensive TEAC CD player, Axiom M3Ti bookshelf speakers on stands).Will I be able to hear any difference?
In my experience, the outlet & power supply to a cheap CDP makes a huge difference, but the power supply (the cord) perhaps a bit more than the outlet. So, consider a humble suggestion: replace your CDP's power cord with a shielded cord (I used a stock Belden power cord -- search the archives -- for about $9) and was blown away by the improvement in warmth and detail and the removal of the "CD harshness" on my Rotel 951.
nt
High end is as high end does...some "tweaks" are actually more effective in modest systems than expensive ones, IMHO... plus on the overall scale of things, this might be one of those things you have to try for yourself, as the silver Acmes take quite a long while to break in by everyone's account, including mine. Then there's the cryogenic version, but we won't go there, heh...it all gets so darn complicated.
...they're not available in an isolated ground format.
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