would twisted pair from a network cable be suitable as hook-up wires inside an amp?

[jarthel]

someone mentioned that these wires are 24AWG.

thank you.

Jayel

[planet10]

Yes. We use it often... the copper is very pure, and the price is a benefi of the billions of miles of it made for computer use. The teflon jasleted stuff is probably better for the job -- particularily the hi voltage stuff.

dave

[pinkmouse]

I wouldn't use it for anything more than about 30W unless you doubled it up, and I also hate any solid core cable for building prototypes, it's so inflexible that it will break during the inevitable playing around.

[Brian Beck]

30W? Wire doesn't know about watts

The most relevant rating is current. The other relevant rating is insulation voltage rating. As a practical matter, this kind of 24 AWG wire should do very well for most audio chassis hookup use, with the possible exception of heater wiring which can carry a lot of current. As Planet10 says, Teflon is best. Although I've used computer network wires for audio before, I usually use 22AWG Teflon hook-up, just because I have a giant reel of it, but 24AWG ought to do. It's not that the wire would fuse with typical heater currents, but it might exhibit too much IR loss if any appreciable run length is required.

[jrevillug]

Might fuse if you try to run parallel filaments on a quad of 6C33Cs from it though - 26.4A at 6.3v.

James

EDIT- I agree that this is not typical though.

[Brian Beck]

Might fuse if you try to run parallel filaments on a quad of 6C33Cs from it though - 26.4A at 6.3v.

Yeah, that would not a be good thing!

I was surprised that my reference book shows the fusing current of 24AWG copper wire (uninsulated, standard conditions, etc., etc.) to be 29.2 amperes! Of course, well before then it will be smoking hot and any insulation will be vaporizing into toxic fumes. Just as a rough rule of thumb, I would probably allow no more than about 1 ampere of current through a 24AWG wire.

[pinkmouse]

Originally posted by Brian Beck
30W? Wire doesn't know about watts

Indeed. But an output power of less than 30W likely has currents and voltages that are within the tolerance of 24AWG.

[Brian Beck]

Oh, OK then. I'll let that slide Especially since you're a moderator.

[serengetiplains]

Belden manufactures certain types of this wire using foam dielectric with low dielectric constant, if you're wanting that n-th degree of performance. One such dielectric goes by the name Datalene. Another is simply foam teflon. The wire is of course bulkier per a given voltage rating given its Swiss cheese nature.

[phn]

Get Cat 6 cable. It's thicker.

It's very likely multi-strand patch cable is OFC. OFC is an industry standard. It makes the copper softer.

Multi-strand cable of the same gauge is thinner than solid core. The electrons travel on the surface where the resistance is lower. (High-bandwith coax use silver-plated steel core.) There's more surface in a multi-strand cable. Gauge, if I remember correctly, was originally based on flow-thru.