There is no winding technique that is the best.
If you want to create a good IC the things to consider are:
The diameter of the strands used. You will never build a great cable using single diameter strands. Thick ones alone will never be any good, thin, even if you put hundreds of them (litz strands do best) never will work best as the combination of many diffrent dimensions. Cardas knows that, Audio Note and other high end brands too.
Second to this is the purity of material, the better the better.
Next thing is shielding, there is no high quality interconnect without shielding, but shielding applied wrong way will do more harm than benefits. Shielding is must, but proprly applied.
Consider dielectric used, teflon, poliethylene, I like cotton for example.
And after that you might consider some geometry techniques, diffrent style of windings etc.
Without the above considering gemetry or winding is pointless like 99% of DIY Audio cables projects out there, especially silver single strand ones.
Cheers
If you want to create a good IC the things to consider are:
The diameter of the strands used. You will never build a great cable using single diameter strands. Thick ones alone will never be any good, thin, even if you put hundreds of them (litz strands do best) never will work best as the combination of many diffrent dimensions. Cardas knows that, Audio Note and other high end brands too.
Second to this is the purity of material, the better the better.
Next thing is shielding, there is no high quality interconnect without shielding, but shielding applied wrong way will do more harm than benefits. Shielding is must, but proprly applied.
Consider dielectric used, teflon, poliethylene, I like cotton for example.
And after that you might consider some geometry techniques, diffrent style of windings etc.
Without the above considering gemetry or winding is pointless like 99% of DIY Audio cables projects out there, especially silver single strand ones.
Cheers
Actually, I would consider the capacitance per foot as being important.
The inductance per foot, if meaningful can be considered.
Personally, I am not a fan of solid core - but it can be an inexpensive way to get into a silver interconnect.
Shielding adds to capacitance.
Andrew T might want to suggest some practical building methodology for air dielectric cables?
We can dispense with the vacuum concept I suspect??
_-_-bear
The inductance per foot, if meaningful can be considered.
Personally, I am not a fan of solid core - but it can be an inexpensive way to get into a silver interconnect.
Shielding adds to capacitance.
Andrew T might want to suggest some practical building methodology for air dielectric cables?
We can dispense with the vacuum concept I suspect??
_-_-bear
This is completely against my, and hundreds of my clients, experience. 10 years ago, I wrote the SuperCables CookBook and have sold thousands of copies since. It was recently completely revised and updated, the key new I/C design using three very thin BRAIDED silver solid core wires. TO DATE, THIS EASY TO MAKE CABLE HAS PROVEN TO BE A SUPERB PERFORMER, BETTERING IN ONE TEST, THE $35,000 Nordost Odin I/C.
Our SilverFoil design, also in the book, can sound even better, butit's very high capacitance needs a lot of potential driving current.
OK?
Regards, Allen
Hi Allen,
I'm not a fan of "very thin" ... YMMV.
My own product Silver Lightning has been the same and stable since ~1990 uses three wires in a braid. The Balanced version uses 5 wires. There is some yin/yang in the choice of "wire" for everything... "a superb performer" too!
Everyone probably knows that Kimber uses a braid - mine too, but a difference recipe in important ways... I do prefer multi-gauge stranded, but this is not available to the DIYer...
Allen's book is a good read, fwiw.
Marce, how much is the dielectric going to effect a capacitor?
The bottom line is that in many systems, the choice of interconnect appears to effect what people report hearing. Measurements may or may not correlate to what is heard.
_-_-bear
I'm not a fan of "very thin" ... YMMV.
My own product Silver Lightning has been the same and stable since ~1990 uses three wires in a braid. The Balanced version uses 5 wires. There is some yin/yang in the choice of "wire" for everything... "a superb performer" too!
Everyone probably knows that Kimber uses a braid - mine too, but a difference recipe in important ways... I do prefer multi-gauge stranded, but this is not available to the DIYer...
Allen's book is a good read, fwiw.
Marce, how much is the dielectric going to effect a capacitor?
The bottom line is that in many systems, the choice of interconnect appears to effect what people report hearing. Measurements may or may not correlate to what is heard.
_-_-bear
Halo, thanks for your opinion. What exactly is in total oposit to your and your clients expirence?
I do not know your book, nor the cable buliding techniques, sorry. But I have a quite a good expirence in building cables and these are my expirences based on many many hundreds of cables built. Looking at some well known brands they follow similar paths considering using diffrent diameter conductors.
By three very thin BRAIDED silver solid core wires you mean solid core silver conductors shielded with some kind of braid?
I have made many many DIY Audio cable projects from the internet in the past, many of them claiming to beat high $$$ Audio cables but comparing them to expensive high end cables always turned them to bee poor performance. This applies to all the Belden based cables, X-Ubyte, solid core silver conductors and many many others I don't even remember right now.There is no cheap and easy to make recipe for the very high quality cable in my opinion. Agree foil conductors have great potential. But many thanks for your opinion Allen I would like to hear more about your expirences and designs.
Thanks
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Agree solid core conductors might be inexpensive way to make a good performing cable but not high quality.
In my expirence capacitance itself is not important as long as it is low enough not to make any trouble to the components the interconnect is connecting, but might be more important with longer runs.
Yes shielding adds capacitance, especially poorly applied. Well applied adds very little and the benefits are huge. In my opinion there is no high quality cable without shielding. But agree that sometimes poorly applied shielding might be worse than no shielding.
Air dielectric might be easy to make if one is creative. But using air dielectric with poor conductors, poor geometry or lack of well applied shielding will not help the cable to be any good. Tried that many times. Sure it might help if all other apsects of building are well thought and we want to get even better cable. That are just my opinions based on my expirences. and I prefer high quality copper in litz but that's just me.
Thanks
Anytime you use a braided shield you create a coaxial cable... they tend to have various amounts of C per foot (or meter, if you prefer). That can be a problem in various ways.
In my experience the capacitance itself IS important.
The significance varies a bit depending on the preamp and load being driven - which is why all systems are not equal and all cables to do not perform equally well in all systems.
_-_-bear
In my experience the capacitance itself IS important.
The significance varies a bit depending on the preamp and load being driven - which is why all systems are not equal and all cables to do not perform equally well in all systems.
_-_-bear
The Source MUST be capable of driving the cables and the Receiver.
If you have 500pF in the cable and the receiver is 10k//100pF then the Source must be able to drive 10k//600pF at the highest frequencies that your source can transmit.
Whether it's silver or copper or wet string for a cable, does not matter. The Source must drive the load.
If you have 500pF in the cable and the receiver is 10k//100pF then the Source must be able to drive 10k//600pF at the highest frequencies that your source can transmit.
Whether it's silver or copper or wet string for a cable, does not matter. The Source must drive the load.
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I will tell a little about my expirences.
After building numerous solid core conductor cables few years ago, both using enameled high quality copper and solid core silver in many configuations and guages, air dielectric and other types, shielded and not shielded, braided or twisted diffrent ways (XLO style for example) I was never satisfied.
So I did this experiment. I ordered all sizes of the individual enameled strands available from Percy Audio. These were spools of Cardas single strand of litz wire ranging from 29ga up to 37ga I belive.
I wanted to hear how the size of individual strand translate to the sound I hear. Obviously using thin ones I had to use more of them and less of the thicker one. I tried to keep the same or similar cross sections area.
So I constructed about 6 or 7 IC's each using only one guage size of conductor. Started at one of 29ga ended with 36 for each + and - of 37ga strand (total 144 strands for the IC). The most interesting were built with 33ga, 35ga and 37ga strands.
All of the cables were built exactly the same, the bundles of strands got cotton sleeve, were spaced a 2-3 mm apart and had a properly applied copper foil + tinned copper braid (both isolated ) shielding. all terminated with GRMO Cardas RCA connectors. It took 2-3 days for each IC to build.
The results were spectacular and gave me a lot of knolwedge about interconnects and cables in general. Each of them was diffrent and each geave exeptional results in some areas of performance while lacking a lot in others. But my general conclusion was that there is no high quality cable without diffrent guages used.
It kind of remind me the situation were a single drivers is used to cover all the frequency in the loudspeaker, sure some can be really pleasing but no full range driver has a fineze of high frequency tweeter and at the same time the bass quality of 12 or 15" TAD or JBL bass driver.
This applies only to round conductors as I had a little better expirences with foil conductors but in my opinion they are not perfect enough to use single size/thicknes of foil conductor.
I remember Audio Note VZ few years back was built with many many same guage but very thin enameled silver strands. I belive later they switched to diffrend guages.
I did many similar expirences with diffrent style of winding, shielding and dielectric used and that is pretty much where my knowledge comes from.
Thanks
After building numerous solid core conductor cables few years ago, both using enameled high quality copper and solid core silver in many configuations and guages, air dielectric and other types, shielded and not shielded, braided or twisted diffrent ways (XLO style for example) I was never satisfied.
So I did this experiment. I ordered all sizes of the individual enameled strands available from Percy Audio. These were spools of Cardas single strand of litz wire ranging from 29ga up to 37ga I belive.
I wanted to hear how the size of individual strand translate to the sound I hear. Obviously using thin ones I had to use more of them and less of the thicker one. I tried to keep the same or similar cross sections area.
So I constructed about 6 or 7 IC's each using only one guage size of conductor. Started at one of 29ga ended with 36 for each + and - of 37ga strand (total 144 strands for the IC). The most interesting were built with 33ga, 35ga and 37ga strands.
All of the cables were built exactly the same, the bundles of strands got cotton sleeve, were spaced a 2-3 mm apart and had a properly applied copper foil + tinned copper braid (both isolated ) shielding. all terminated with GRMO Cardas RCA connectors. It took 2-3 days for each IC to build.
The results were spectacular and gave me a lot of knolwedge about interconnects and cables in general. Each of them was diffrent and each geave exeptional results in some areas of performance while lacking a lot in others. But my general conclusion was that there is no high quality cable without diffrent guages used.
It kind of remind me the situation were a single drivers is used to cover all the frequency in the loudspeaker, sure some can be really pleasing but no full range driver has a fineze of high frequency tweeter and at the same time the bass quality of 12 or 15" TAD or JBL bass driver.
This applies only to round conductors as I had a little better expirences with foil conductors but in my opinion they are not perfect enough to use single size/thicknes of foil conductor.
I remember Audio Note VZ few years back was built with many many same guage but very thin enameled silver strands. I belive later they switched to diffrend guages.
I did many similar expirences with diffrent style of winding, shielding and dielectric used and that is pretty much where my knowledge comes from.
Thanks
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Brian: Are you the Judean People's Front?
Reg: **** off.
Brian: What?
Reg: Judean People's Front. We're the People's Front of Judea. Judean
People's front, caw.
Francis: ****kers.
Brian: Can I join your group?
Reg: No. **** off.
Brian: I didn't want to sell this stuff. It's only a job. I hate the Romans
as much as anybody.
PFJ: Sssh. Ssssh, sssh, sssh, ssssh
Judith: Are you sure?
Brian: Oh. Dead sure... I hate the Romans already.
Reg: Listen. If you really wanted to join the PFJ, you'd have to really
hate the Romans.
Brian: I do.
Reg: Oh yeah? How much?
Brian: A lot!
Reg: Right. You're in. Listen. The only people we hate more than the
Romans are the ****ing Judean People's Front.
PFJ: Yeah
Judith: Splitters.
Francis: And the Judean Popular Peoples Front.
PFJ: Oh yeah. Splitters.
Loretta: And the peoples Front of Judea.
PFJ: Splitters.
Reg: What?
Loretta: The Peoples front of Judea. Splitters.
Reg: We're the Peoples front of Judea.
Loretta: Oh. I thought we were the Popular Front.
Reg: Peoples Front.
Francis: Whatever happened to the Popular Front, Reg?
Reg: He's over there.
--------[A single old man sits on a lower seat.]
--------{Some POPULAR front, eh?}
PFJ:: [To the old man.] SPLITTER!
Reg: **** off.
Brian: What?
Reg: Judean People's Front. We're the People's Front of Judea. Judean
People's front, caw.
Francis: ****kers.
Brian: Can I join your group?
Reg: No. **** off.
Brian: I didn't want to sell this stuff. It's only a job. I hate the Romans
as much as anybody.
PFJ: Sssh. Ssssh, sssh, sssh, ssssh
Judith: Are you sure?
Brian: Oh. Dead sure... I hate the Romans already.
Reg: Listen. If you really wanted to join the PFJ, you'd have to really
hate the Romans.
Brian: I do.
Reg: Oh yeah? How much?
Brian: A lot!
Reg: Right. You're in. Listen. The only people we hate more than the
Romans are the ****ing Judean People's Front.
PFJ: Yeah
Judith: Splitters.
Francis: And the Judean Popular Peoples Front.
PFJ: Oh yeah. Splitters.
Loretta: And the peoples Front of Judea.
PFJ: Splitters.
Reg: What?
Loretta: The Peoples front of Judea. Splitters.
Reg: We're the Peoples front of Judea.
Loretta: Oh. I thought we were the Popular Front.
Reg: Peoples Front.
Francis: Whatever happened to the Popular Front, Reg?
Reg: He's over there.
--------[A single old man sits on a lower seat.]
--------{Some POPULAR front, eh?}
PFJ:: [To the old man.] SPLITTER!
No, three 0.25mm diameter polyurethane insulated silver solid core wires, braided together - like a Norwegian woman's hair. No shielding is needed.
You can get the book from the on-line shop on my website: Vacuum State - High End Hifi Equipment
regards, Allen
Andrew, still wondering about your air dielectric method?
Also, if the cable is totaling LESS than say 100pf, then you can use it with a far greater number of driving units than you can with a higher capacitance cable, eh? So, there may be some merit solely on basis for using lower C cables??
So, following along this line, IF the driving circuit has loop feedback from the output, it will "see" the capacitance and that will in turn effect to waveform via the feedback. How much? Does it matter? Is it audible? Well, certainly no matter what "less is more" in this case one may conclude...
_-_-bear
Also, if the cable is totaling LESS than say 100pf, then you can use it with a far greater number of driving units than you can with a higher capacitance cable, eh? So, there may be some merit solely on basis for using lower C cables??
So, following along this line, IF the driving circuit has loop feedback from the output, it will "see" the capacitance and that will in turn effect to waveform via the feedback. How much? Does it matter? Is it audible? Well, certainly no matter what "less is more" in this case one may conclude...
_-_-bear
less contact for the dielectric !
What else would one expect to the question?
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