[Vintage-Audio]V40#15- BIG Wire

[Phil Barnes-Roberts WA6DZS]

vintage-audio-request at mailman.qth.net opined  on 11/28/2007 01:03 AM:
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Subject: Re: [Vintage-Audio] Re Speaker Wire Options
> From: "wolfbob" <wolfbob at csnsys.com>
> Date: Tue, 27 Nov 2007 19:29:40 -0800
> To: "Vintage home and professional audio equipment from 1975 back" 
> <vintage-audio at mailman.qth.net>
> 
> Duane.
> 
> I said it before and will always say it. USE BIG WIRE. Think of Ohms Law 
> a minute. If you are running 20 watts into what is probably 4 ohms (at 
> 50-100 Hz into a big speaker. They are 8 ohms or so at 1000Hz) you will 
> have about 9 volts across the speaker and will be drawing about 2.5 
> amps. Now if your speaker wire has 0.5 ohm of resistance you will loose 
> 1.25 volts or about 2 dB of bass. You can easily hear this loss. If you 
> don't believe me run your #24+ wire and in parallel run some #14 or #12 
> and do an A/B test and play your bass singer. He will fade into the 
> background. I have #14 speaker wire ala RS running to all my speakers. 
> Things get much worse if you are punching those JBLs with some real 
> peaks. They just won't be peaks anymore as the IR losses eat away your 
> great audio.
> 
> WBob
> 
Hi, Guys (&Gals)--

Not having run across #24 'Speed Wire' I'll have to pass on it; sounds 
like phone-closet twisted-pair stuff, though, or doorbell wire.  Light. 
  Way light.

You've reminded me of something K8EBR, Tom Pierce told me one day in the 
EMC Lab at JPL, that agrees with Bob.

If you really want 8-ohm-impedance pair wire, get some (surplus?) 
RG-11/U coax (stored indoors is best, so we'll hope it's uncontaminated 
with the jacket plasticizers after years in the sun, or on the shelf).

Ignore the center conductor, and tie-wrap two pieces of this 
half-inch-or-so coax together along their length.  That size conductor, 
jacket and spacing is supposed to come out to eight ohms.  Twisting 
together (obviously, not very tight) helps cancel out fields over the 
length of the run - with any pair.

You'd probably have to skin back jackets and braids, remove some center 
conductor and inner poly insulation, and twist the two stranded braids 
into a pair for your connections.  A monster indeed!  Anybody hear this 
one before?

-- 
'---O=o=O---'
73, Phil Barnes-Roberts WA6DZS < Mailto:pbarnrob at acm dot org >
"When you are trying to get a handle on a big decision, try looking
at it like this; 'What kind of world do I want to live in?'"
  --Ann Bodenhamer Martin, author of /Calico/ /Families/