For something as short as internal wire, I really don't think wire types would make any difference as long as they are not ridiculously thin.
Even then my household fuse uses 3 strand of 0.-something mm wire and it's ok transmitting 220v to refrigerators, washing machine, etc.
Any difference heard, unless verified by measuring tools, I would be very suspicious of placebo effects.
Even then my household fuse uses 3 strand of 0.-something mm wire and it's ok transmitting 220v to refrigerators, washing machine, etc.
Any difference heard, unless verified by measuring tools, I would be very suspicious of placebo effects.
The Acoustic Energy AE1 uses a bundle of individually insulated wires internally from the terminals to the crossover and from the crossover to the drivers.
They hide what look like expensive cables and don't make copy out of their expense to improve performance.
Would AE waste money on hidden cables if they did not think it was worth it?
In this case worth must be related to audio performance rather than for sales hype.
They hide what look like expensive cables and don't make copy out of their expense to improve performance.
Would AE waste money on hidden cables if they did not think it was worth it?
In this case worth must be related to audio performance rather than for sales hype.
Cousin Billy said:
The optimum wire dia will always be a compromise. For the driver you've mentioned, there are other criteria that must be met than with the cables feeding the speaker, thus the optimum dia. will differ.
My experience show that larger dia cables sound better for bass while smaller dia are better with HF. The optimum must be reached somewhere between the two.
I don't see the harm in just using some excess speaker cable for internal wiring.
The runs are relatively short so it's probably fairly forgiving of higher resistance wiring, but I've usually got speaker wire left over anyway and the short runs would make it incredibly cheap if you needed to buy some more anyway.
The runs are relatively short so it's probably fairly forgiving of higher resistance wiring, but I've usually got speaker wire left over anyway and the short runs would make it incredibly cheap if you needed to buy some more anyway.
I read with some interest the JadeM experiments and then played around not just with the wire inside the speaker but all the way from the amp. I certainly saw a difference replacing the stranded wire in the box with solid core soldered on to the speaker terminals. Also saw quite a bit of difference in varying configurations of speaker wire and followed the JadM idea of keeping the conductors separated from each other by a consistent gap of about 1".
I ended up bi wiring using 12 gauge copper magnet wire from the amp to the main driver. I used a separate run of 18 gauge copper plus a couple of strands of 28 gauge silver to the tweeters + & - are an inch apart sandwiched in packing tape. everything is kept off the floor (yes you can hear the difference) all connections are well soldered. Very happy with the results.
I think you are both looking at the problem wrong, and asking a somewhat impossible question. The power consumed by any speaker is related to the voltage that is applied to the driver squared divided by the impedance -
P = E²/R (where 'E' equal voltage)
But the voltage depends on the signal. If the music has lots of midrange, then we will have lots of voltage on the midrange speaker. If the music has lots of treble, then we will have lots of voltage on the Tweeter. And if it doesn't have those, then we don't.
I think the question you may be trying to determine is the Power Distribution across the Frequency Spectrum. It is actually far different than most people think.
For full orchestral music, the bulk of the power is consumed in the 250hz to 500hz region. ("How to Build Speaker Enclosures" Badmaieff & Davis; Pg 118; Fig. 7-1)
As a point of illustration, lets assume we are consuming 10 watts in the 250hz to 500hz region. That means in the 500hz to 1,000hz range we consume about 2 watts; 1,000hz to 2,000hz = 1.5 watts, 2,000hz to 4,000hz = 1 watt, and 4,000hz and higher = 0.5 watts.
Going down in frequency; in the 125hz to 250hz range we consume 4 watts, 63hz to 125hz = 2 watts, below 63hz about 1.5 watts.
So, though not the way most people assume, the woofer does take the bulk of the power. That 'bulk of power' is not in the ultra low frequencies, but as indicated in the 250hz to 500hz range.
This is for Full Orchestral Music. There might be a little more power in the low end, but still not as much as you might think. But I don't see much different in the mids and highs with modern styles of music, and that is the area we are concerned with here.
So, if we extend this, if we have a 100 watt woofer, we could have a 20 watt midrange, and a 10 watt tweeter, and still consider it a 100 watt speaker system. Though, I don't think I would personally cut it that thin, but 100w low, 60w mid, and 30w high wouldn't be out of the question.
As to wire gauge, yes you can certainly use thinner wire on the tweeter, because less power, therefore less current, is going to be consumed in that area of the frequency spectrum.
Personally though, I don't think I would go any less than 18ga (AWG) wire for the midrange and tweeters. Certainly you could go less, but why? A foot or so of good speaker wire is relatively cheap. Why skimp?
If you building your own speakers, some say the wire inside the cabinet should be more of the wire found outside the cabinet. If it is good enough to run 6 feet from you amp to your speaker, it should be good enough to run that last foot or so from the speaker terminals to the drivers.
As to larger wire causing 'smear' in the tweeters, I'd like to see some scientific evidence to back that up. Not subjective impression, but science. Current either flows or it doesn't, or so it would seem.
Out of curiosity does anyone have a link to a Audio Power Spectrum Chart? That would certainly help.
Just a few thoughts.
Steve/bluewizard
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Quality apart, I noticed a pretty big improvement in the bass response when I rewired my Ushers with 11.5ga Cardas hook-up wire for the woofers (the originals were ~18ga speaker wire, the Cardas was the lowest price heavy guage hook-up wire I could buy from Percy). I also noticed some improvement in treble - I used a combination of solid silver 26ga and wonder wire, the tweeter wire used exactly the same speaker wire as the woofer in stock config. I suppose the wire used initially was pretty much bargain-basement stuff, and for a $4000 speaker, that's not saying much.
The comparisons were made with one speaker left stock and the other rewired running off the same channel of an amp (A/B switch), so it was not just placebo. Unfortunately we don't have access to much measurement equipment so more meaningful comparisons were not possible.
For my own builds, given that they use budget drivers, ordinary 10ga speaker or mains hook-up wire proves sufficient if using quick disconnects, or 14AWG if soldering direct. I don't believe in using exotics, but tweeter wires with low inductance and woofer wires of sufficient current-carrying capacity help. The Ushers use about 10 feet of wire for each driver, or 20 feet total of wire inside *each speaker*, so it's not a particularly small run
for the L18 project I'm building, I've elected to use ordinary copper mains hook-up, 2.5mm for the woofers and 1mm for the tweeters.
The comparisons were made with one speaker left stock and the other rewired running off the same channel of an amp (A/B switch), so it was not just placebo. Unfortunately we don't have access to much measurement equipment so more meaningful comparisons were not possible.
For my own builds, given that they use budget drivers, ordinary 10ga speaker or mains hook-up wire proves sufficient if using quick disconnects, or 14AWG if soldering direct. I don't believe in using exotics, but tweeter wires with low inductance and woofer wires of sufficient current-carrying capacity help. The Ushers use about 10 feet of wire for each driver, or 20 feet total of wire inside *each speaker*, so it's not a particularly small run
for the L18 project I'm building, I've elected to use ordinary copper mains hook-up, 2.5mm for the woofers and 1mm for the tweeters.
Yeh, I knew I was taking a chance opening pandora's box! Hopefully by now, those that see no difference should be happy using any old hunk of wire they can find in the garbage bin.Cables. Again?
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