Cotton electrical sleeving

[Alain Favret]

Hello,
I found some tube cotton sleeving, but not too expensive. A large quantity should be ordered, around 50 rolls 150 m each, in 2 mm diameter, around 30 USD each.
Just interested to know if there is some DIYers interested.
Alain

[malisz]

I would.

If I understand correctly, cotton could is beter insulator that e.g. teflon and jacking in silvered copper wires into the sleeves would allow to build e.g. high quality speaker cables.

malisz

[Magura]

Originally posted by malisz
I would.

If I understand correctly, cotton could is beter insulator that e.g. teflon and jacking in silvered copper wires into the sleeves would allow to build e.g. high quality speaker cables.

malisz

You dont understand it correctly!

Teflon is waaay above cotton for insulation.

There are a few challenged individuals out there thats putting in great effort to sell their snake oil about plastics getting magnetic....if you ever find a way to make plastic magnetic, tell me about it. Im sure it would make you rich and famous.

Magura

Edit:

Ive recently made a few tests of OFC copper VS silver plated copper VS pure silver.

I found no difference in perfomance.

What you can gain by using silver plated wire is the protection against oxidation of the copper, so in the long run and if soldered with a solder with min. 2% silver you can gain some in that aspect. Silver serves as far as im concerned no purpose if you can get good quality silver plated copper.

[pburke]

Originally posted by Magura



You dont understand it correctly!

Teflon is waaay above cotton for insulation.

It may be above cotton as a dielectric, but it sounds worse.

I've built a fair share of silver/teflon interconnects. When I moved from the teflon covered silver to bare silver with cotton sleeving, using the same gauge wire and identical geometrical layout of the wire, things finally sounded right. Cotton is probably just a physical buffer around the conductor, as the main material in direct contact with the silver inside a cotton sleeve wire is air, and air is a better dielectric than teflon.

Ultimately, you have to seal the cotton/silver air core from the outside air to limit oxidation, but that's a different subject.

I'd be interested in a roll of that sleeving - got a few users for it in mind.

Peter

[Steve Eddy]

Originally posted by Magura
Teflon is waaay above cotton for insulation.

According to the dielectric constants chart at K-Tek, the dielectric constant of cotton is listed as 1.3 - 1.4 compared to Teflon's 2.0. Of course cotton is more hygroscopic than Teflon, so things will depend on the level of humidity.

se

[Magura]

Thats right in a humidity of 0, reality though is somewhat different. As far as im concerned, the only insulator thats better than teflon is glass.

Teflon is as i remember it the plastic material thats absorbs less water, after that comes some types of polyprpylene.

For insulation matters, the factor that actually makes the difference is water....how big a percentage of water the material has.

So with all that taken into account instead of just looking at an isolated dielectric value under lab conditions.....teflon all of a sudden seems a lot more attractive.

Magura

[fdegrove]

Hi,

Watch out....
There's a lot of "fake" cotton floating around.

For optimum results the cotton must be of the unbleached variety and of selected Egyptian crop.

If you're really after the cream of the crop...Ah well, in that case you'll have to get yourself a shipload of the thing and insist it was picked around midnight during full moon.

Naturally all that fancy stuff is going to be looking at those horrendous inductors wound from a spool of ordinary OFC enamelled solid core...

So, to my mind that's exactly what should do for speaker wire, ya good ole magnet wire....After all it's airtight and at such low impedances you can just about use any insulator, can't you?

Cheers,

[Magura]

You got a great sense of humor Frank.

ROTFLMAO.



Magura

[Steve Eddy]

Originally posted by Magura
Thats right in a humidity of 0, reality though is somewhat different. As far as im concerned, the only insulator thats better than teflon is glass.

Teflon is as i remember it the plastic material thats absorbs less water, after that comes some types of polyprpylene.

For insulation matters, the factor that actually makes the difference is water....how big a percentage of water the material has.

So with all that taken into account instead of just looking at an isolated dielectric value under lab conditions.....teflon all of a sudden seems a lot more attractive.

Sure, if all one is doing is chasing after objective specs.

But shouldn't how the result sounds to a particular individual be taken into account as well? I mean, at the end of the day, that's what it's all about isn't it?

I don't know about you, but for me, the purpose of my system isn't to satisfy some set of objective specs and measurements. Its purpose is to satisfy me.

Some people prefer cotton over Teflon. For those people, cotton therefore is the better, more attractive insulator.

se

[Elso Kwak]

Cotton? I prefer NOS (That is New Old Stock) WWII (World War 2) rubber! Seems to be cotton on the outside.
Kuei Yang Bang would argue that NOS is a oxymoron