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So....... that article pertains to "effects" happening in the range of Mhz to Ghz, certainly not something to do with audio or things we humans can actually "hear".
Same thing as "skin effect" of electrons down a wire.... it's only a concern in the Mhz/Ghz area.
Nevertheless, this site's about audio, so, no need to suffer over it all.
but from some writings it seams there are people on this forum that worry about the skin effect and hence perhaps they can hear rf
Only if they're alien beings from another planet...
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Nothing really to say other than most higher end RF connectors are silver.
(As I have always understood it Silver is a better conductor than gold.)
At Audio it probably doesn't matter and since silver tarnishes most
people would probably prefer to see gold over tarnished silver.
Thanks Harry!
I've found some comments regarding the advantages of silver plated RF connectors here:
Why are some electrical connectors silver plated? - Amateur Radio Stack Exchange
Standard Neutrik XLRs have thick(ish) silver coating.
Those are the ones one would use for mic cables as they get constantly re-plugged and there are wipers in there too keeping things clean.
For anything that gets more or less permanently connected I'd use the gold plated ones.
I had the standard silver ones go bad/intermittent if kept in one socket too long but that goes away after a few plugging cycles.
Those are the ones one would use for mic cables as they get constantly re-plugged and there are wipers in there too keeping things clean.
For anything that gets more or less permanently connected I'd use the gold plated ones.
I had the standard silver ones go bad/intermittent if kept in one socket too long but that goes away after a few plugging cycles.
In my youth, we still used whale-oil for watches. Whale oil persisted in automatic transmission fluid until shockingly recently. I would not doubt that Shalco tried whale-oil in rotary attenuators.
Whale oil as lubricant
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In the high end audio gear that I've followed, the platinum group of noble metals seem to be preferred and sometimes used. Rhodium, for example. And not too much either, most of the metals seem to be more expensive than gold, but are more durable as connectors and switch contacts. In this context, absolute conductivity isn't much of an issue.
Gold plate (on nickle or other suitable metals) is about as rich as I get.
Gold plate (on nickle or other suitable metals) is about as rich as I get.
My understanding is that silver oxide still conducts very well. Also have read (it was published in Sound Practice magazine, author IIRC was Allen Wright) about a pro who replaced all the patch bay connectors and channel strip in/out of a studio recording desk with gold plated types, only to be less than impressed to the point where he reversed the 'upgrade'.
I think the concept of RCA connectors is junk. I much prefer XLR type for both balanced and unbalanced connectors, never had a problem with long established professional connectors such as Switchcraft.
HK
Coconut
Try a bit of purified coconut oil. One of the most neutral oils around. Don't know if that would go for the sonic side of it however
Try a bit of purified coconut oil. One of the most neutral oils around. Don't know if that would go for the sonic side of it however
Rhodium
A lot of Mil-spec switches have silver contacts and the wiper is Rhodium. This provides a good contact and as the switch is rotated (due to the rhodium) the wiper auto-cleans the contact surface. Have one of these in a 24-way dual-gang switch somewhere that I still want to make a volume control from.
A lot of Mil-spec switches have silver contacts and the wiper is Rhodium. This provides a good contact and as the switch is rotated (due to the rhodium) the wiper auto-cleans the contact surface. Have one of these in a 24-way dual-gang switch somewhere that I still want to make a volume control from.
On a Dual turntable I recently serviced for someone, I got readings of 800 ohms across the cartridge output cable on one channel. - that channel's audio was lower.
Yet, across the actual cartridge I read 680 ohms.
The added "resistive" component was the flat silver-plated mating contacts in the cartridge carrier and tonearm headshell.
Once the tarnish was removed, all was well again.
Thanks Charles and greetings from the Galapagos. My previous comment is based in 'heresay', not heresy, and I don't have any meaningful input other than what was considered 'worthy to publish' at the time. I suspect it was based upon subjective differences and not objective numbers, which brings us back to 'audio'.
I'd be interested to learn the conductivity of copper oxide (that's what I'd call oxidated copper - I don't know how else to name it, in light of recent post: copper sulphate perhaps?).
The turtles be kind, be kin with the turtles (Charles would have loved that).
Kind regards,
HK
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