Thanks! That Austrian company treats brass instruments though. Interesting if players of those instruments can hear any difference after the treatment.
I'd be interested in the process of annealing. When a metal is sufficiently heated, existing crystal structures are lost and they redevelop during the cooling process. The recrystallisation temperature of steel tends to be around 400°-700°C, nickel also shows recrystallisation in this range.
Metals tend to become emissive at temperatures higher than 700°C.
That Austrian company recommended by pcan cools down to -180C. Below is a quote from their website:
"With our confidential process we slowly reduce the temperature down to -180°C – this takes a few hours. Afterwards the instruments will be heated up and cooled down again several times – all within the negative temperatures. This we call “multi stage treatment”. After several hours we slowly increase the temperature to slightly above room temperature – the process is finished."
I contacted them and I was advised they treated 7.000 meter of cable last year. They also regularly do treatment of electron tubes so they seem to know how to do that 🙂
"With our confidential process we slowly reduce the temperature down to -180°C – this takes a few hours. Afterwards the instruments will be heated up and cooled down again several times – all within the negative temperatures. This we call “multi stage treatment”. After several hours we slowly increase the temperature to slightly above room temperature – the process is finished."
I contacted them and I was advised they treated 7.000 meter of cable last year. They also regularly do treatment of electron tubes so they seem to know how to do that 🙂
Please do NOT quote the entire post just above yours. Recent forum software changes have been made to prevent this practice. Do not work around the new changes.Over quotes have been cleaned up.
I don't know and I didn't ask. I assume they also don't ask the customer for the reason, they just simply do the cryogenic treatment.
They say: "With the TTB you can increase the wear resistance, reduce stresses in the material, achieve maximum precision in the component, increase fatigue strength, and improve thermal and electrical conductivity." Which makes sense.
They also say: "Audio cables and vacuum tubes-
The DCT of various electronic components for audio application (HIFI) will give you an improved sound quality with clearer heights and strong basses." Which makes me wonder how improved (I presume they mean increased?) conductivity does that.
They also say: "Audio cables and vacuum tubes-
The DCT of various electronic components for audio application (HIFI) will give you an improved sound quality with clearer heights and strong basses." Which makes me wonder how improved (I presume they mean increased?) conductivity does that.
Since they are not located that far from me the shipping cost will not be high so I am going to try this treatment.
What are you going to have treated? Regards tubes, increasing fatigue strength could be beneficial.
I was thinking of sending them a pair of RCA interconnects and a set of tubes, but I am not 100% sure yet about the tubes. I might decide to send 2 sets of interconnects.
Low temperature degrades some non-metallic insulation materials. I would not treat rubber coated cables. The parts inside the tube have slightly different thermal expansion and contraction rates, so the thermal shock can theoretically deform the structure. But it should be a negligible amount, because the tubes are designed to withstand a positive thermal shock at 200C. To be safe, I would not treat frame grid tubes like ECC88, and also large directly heated tubes that could be damaged by a rough handling during shipping.
Non reversible temperature sensitive labels for negative temperatures are not available, unlike those for positive temperatures. Cryo-treatment on devices that are not simple pieces of iron (that can be analyzed with metallurgical techniques) is ultimately a matter of faith: there is no way to know if it has been performed as promised.
Non reversible temperature sensitive labels for negative temperatures are not available, unlike those for positive temperatures. Cryo-treatment on devices that are not simple pieces of iron (that can be analyzed with metallurgical techniques) is ultimately a matter of faith: there is no way to know if it has been performed as promised.
The base is glued onto the glass envelope, but I have not seen glue in the internals of a valve. Not to say it hasn't been done, but I'd doubt it. Heat, vacuum and glue are not a good mix.
Ah, thank you.
In that case why would you subject tubes to a process that is not glue friendly?
Why would you trust a company extolling the virtues of DFC wood, when another won't touch it as it has no effect?
Doesn't seem a particularly affordable process*
*My definition of affordable my not be yours.
In that case why would you subject tubes to a process that is not glue friendly?
Why would you trust a company extolling the virtues of DFC wood, when another won't touch it as it has no effect?
Doesn't seem a particularly affordable process*
*My definition of affordable my not be yours.
Cryotreating tools is fine, is one system of tempering or heat treating, it changes crystal size and *hardens* them.
It changes **mechanical** properties.
But:
is b*llsh*t , pure and simple.
Not even nonsense, it goes well beyond that.
Doubly so on tubes, where high working temperature , at the near side of red hot, absolutely *destroys* any cryo treatment possible.
Imagine bragging about dehydrating a cookie through varios expensive methods,say infrared heat, chemical absorption of humidity, high vacuum drying ... and then submerging it in a glass of milk for breakfast.
Same thing.
It might improve brass in a wind instrument, or a guitar string tensile strength, but ... on the WOOD?????? 😕 😱 🙄
Those are con men of the worst kind.
Cables are made out of metal, what´s being called nonsense is it´s "useful" effect on wood and similar non crystalline or amprphous substances.
And if copper is heated to 300/400C it gets annealed and is back to plain vanilla copper.
And absolute best case, all you got is a resistance change (any mechanical change such as hardness, tensile strength, etc. is irrelevant).
Not enough to justify or explain claimed "virtues" of "musicality", "extended bass and treble", and other nonsense.
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I'll pile on a little bit - but even though I have strong opinions on this topic (having spent 1/2 of my career as a materials engineer) - I will keep these opinions mostly to myself.
However, please remember that different materials react differently to thermal treatments & that unless there's a phase transition taking place, microstructural changes in metals are very temperature sensitive (usually exponentially) - with changes taking place faster as the temperature goes up & slower as it goes down.
Steel (not Iron) undergoes a martinsitic transition at low temperatures, which makes it considerably harder (good for tools). Materials used for tubes & electronics do not have a transition like this.
So, saying that cryo treatment improves tools made from steel has little meaning for wires and tubes.
Rich
However, please remember that different materials react differently to thermal treatments & that unless there's a phase transition taking place, microstructural changes in metals are very temperature sensitive (usually exponentially) - with changes taking place faster as the temperature goes up & slower as it goes down.
Steel (not Iron) undergoes a martinsitic transition at low temperatures, which makes it considerably harder (good for tools). Materials used for tubes & electronics do not have a transition like this.
So, saying that cryo treatment improves tools made from steel has little meaning for wires and tubes.
Rich