Called an alloy with a base metal of copper. Varies by the percentage of the alloying metals mixed with the copper. The field of metallurgy has been around since, well, the Bronze Age.
Look up composition of brass. A slight change in the alloying ingredients makes bronze.
Make some interconnects out of gold. Then you'll see why interconnects aren't made of gold. Gold plating is because oxidized metal interconnects can affect the sound. If you ever had an oxidized tube pin you'll see first hand that oxidation effects on the sound. That's all I really care about is the sound.
Pure silver/gold interconnects aren't required, a waste of money. If you've got the money, buy or make some. Let everybody know how much it affects the sound.
Look up composition of brass. A slight change in the alloying ingredients makes bronze.
Make some interconnects out of gold. Then you'll see why interconnects aren't made of gold. Gold plating is because oxidized metal interconnects can affect the sound. If you ever had an oxidized tube pin you'll see first hand that oxidation effects on the sound. That's all I really care about is the sound.
Pure silver/gold interconnects aren't required, a waste of money. If you've got the money, buy or make some. Let everybody know how much it affects the sound.
This is how the cheap and nasty stuff is made. Decent connectors have the gold applied directly on the copper.
Usually hard gold plating is applied on contacts and other connectors. Hard gold is an alloy, not pure gold.
And that nasty black stuff on the silver connectors, wires etc. is silver sulphide. It is also somewhat conductive. The good thing is that it comes off by wear, i.e. when you do and undo the connection.
No. Directly plating gold onto a copper base leads to atomical migration of copper through the gold layer leaving you with tarnished spots (-> cheap and nasty). A nickel layer between copper and gold prevents this (-> decent).
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^ Yep schiirrn nails it. We use interfacial layers, especially oxygen gettering/self-passivating ones to ensure good adhesion between the underlying substrate metal (cu in this case) and the surface metal (au, or ag, I suppose, but dumb for the reasons already given). The noble metals tend to have poor adhesion given their non-reactivity, so need to have something else. Nickel is a common one for electroplating over some other metals near it, due to it's ease of electroless chemistry and "less environmentally unfriendly". Nickel works well as a final finish for plenty of applications as its hard and pretty corrosion resistant. Not sure if the respective chemistry to make other transition metals viable or whether they are generally less effective than, Ta, W, Cr, Ni, Co for these applications.
I'm sure some of our more material science heavy guys can correct me on some gaps in my knowledge, which is an incomplete hodge podge.
Given platinum is now cheaper as an industrial metal than gold, I'm surprised more manufacturers haven't switched over. Certainly a *lot* more corrosion resistant and a bit harder.
In any case, this is the vein of discussion that has a very quick trajectory to being locked, which is a bit of a bummer, because it'd be nice to dispel misconceptions about *why* decisions are made and how they affect electrical interconnects over long-term use in a cogent fashion that gets past the "silver has the highest conductivity of any metal at STP, why don't we use it more?!"
I'm sure some of our more material science heavy guys can correct me on some gaps in my knowledge, which is an incomplete hodge podge.
Given platinum is now cheaper as an industrial metal than gold, I'm surprised more manufacturers haven't switched over. Certainly a *lot* more corrosion resistant and a bit harder.
In any case, this is the vein of discussion that has a very quick trajectory to being locked, which is a bit of a bummer, because it'd be nice to dispel misconceptions about *why* decisions are made and how they affect electrical interconnects over long-term use in a cogent fashion that gets past the "silver has the highest conductivity of any metal at STP, why don't we use it more?!"
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I know we are talking low level Audio here, but it´s worth remembering as a side comment that Silver , in the form of heavy Silver "buttons" is a preferred choice in heavy duty contacts such as relays and switches where they outperform others.
Gold plating there? ... it will be vaporized in a millisecond.
Not that unrelated:I expect to see silver buttons in good speaker relay contacts.
Gold plating there? ... it will be vaporized in a millisecond.
Not that unrelated:I expect to see silver buttons in good speaker relay contacts.
True regarding pure gold. Y'all know that 24 carat implies 99.9% gold? Fourteen carat is an alloy (harder). If you've ever owned a gold wedding band, you know that an alloy of gold is better since it doesn't wear as easily as 24 carat gold because it is a harder alloy.
Pure gold is very soft and malleable. It can be easily formed into sheets and wire- compressed and stretched. Good for jewelry, not so good for industrial use in some cases.
Someone should machine some gold interconnects out of 24 carat gold and report the audio results. Me, I'll stick with the few angstroms of gold plating.
Pure gold is very soft and malleable. It can be easily formed into sheets and wire- compressed and stretched. Good for jewelry, not so good for industrial use in some cases.
Someone should machine some gold interconnects out of 24 carat gold and report the audio results. Me, I'll stick with the few angstroms of gold plating.
The oxide is conductive, not the sulphide. It is also very hard to remove.
All my Shallco switches get dismantled once a year for chemical removal of the sulphide. After that, they are unlistenably bright for a week and then they settle. Originally they had some whale oil based lubricant to preserve the contact surfaces but that got dirty and horrible years ago. Not sure if a similar product still exists with all the animal rights nut jobs.
Apparently not. Have had connectors from Furutech, Oyaide, Vampire and none of them had tarnished spots after decades of abuse. The Vampire is gold over silver over copper, the others are directly gold over copper. Used to know what process they use but have long forgotten.
wrong
This is backwards, as has been pointed out. Plating gold directly on copper is easy, but unless it's VERY thick ($$$$) you'd be asking for trouble on many counts. Copper migrates through gold easily and corrodes... the gold then accelerates the corrosion rate. The nickel acts as a diffusion barrier. ALL aerospace, medical, & military equipment are spec'd this way. Keep your day job.
This is backwards, as has been pointed out. Plating gold directly on copper is easy, but unless it's VERY thick ($$$$) you'd be asking for trouble on many counts. Copper migrates through gold easily and corrodes... the gold then accelerates the corrosion rate. The nickel acts as a diffusion barrier. ALL aerospace, medical, & military equipment are spec'd this way. Keep your day job.
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You are just one Google search away from learning that this has of course been done commercially decades ago.
It is amazing how many wire virgins one can find at a wire thread
Nope, ain't gonna waste my time.
I'm going to listen to some music with the gear I have and not worry about plated interconnects.
What I know for sure- I can't hear any difference between solid gold interconnects or gold plated interconnects, but the music sounds good enough for me.
As a retired engineer, I know that corrosion is an issue for something designed to last 30 years, or if it's designed for military use, space flight, etc.
That's not how audio gear is designed for most mass produced audio gear. My gear is a bunch of what some might poo-poo as being non-audiophile quality. I've listened to the high dollar gear. It costs $100k or more for my ears to hear the difference between my junk and the expensive gear. But I'm happy with my gear and know that my enjoyment of the hobby isn't going to be worth a wad of money to make me enjoy it more. It would be like having a trailer queen vehicle that I would be afraid to drive because I might get a ding on the paint. I've also got a live steam locomotive that I built from scratch that no one can buy for any price.
I'm going to listen to some music with the gear I have and not worry about plated interconnects.
What I know for sure- I can't hear any difference between solid gold interconnects or gold plated interconnects, but the music sounds good enough for me.
As a retired engineer, I know that corrosion is an issue for something designed to last 30 years, or if it's designed for military use, space flight, etc.
That's not how audio gear is designed for most mass produced audio gear. My gear is a bunch of what some might poo-poo as being non-audiophile quality. I've listened to the high dollar gear. It costs $100k or more for my ears to hear the difference between my junk and the expensive gear. But I'm happy with my gear and know that my enjoyment of the hobby isn't going to be worth a wad of money to make me enjoy it more. It would be like having a trailer queen vehicle that I would be afraid to drive because I might get a ding on the paint. I've also got a live steam locomotive that I built from scratch that no one can buy for any price.
You are just one Google search away from learning that this has of course been done commercially decades ago.
It is amazing how many wire virgins one can find at a wire thread
Whats amazing is the amount of BS.
More amazing the seemingly insatiable appetite for metallurgy and wire threads when there might actually be something that matters to talk about.
https://www.rfindustries.com/pdfs/white-papers/PIM_RFConnectors.pdf
Skin depth is your answer for RF -- whereas the "basically DC" of audio uses more/all of the core.
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