Try this simple DIY interconnect cable.


Okay, I'd like to weigh in here on the cable issue. First, let me make it perfectly clear that I am not the world's greatest cable expert, I have never heard Valhalla's, Jena Labs, or alot of the others. I am a regular working Joe who thinks that cables do make a difference but can't afford $5k-$10k to buy them. I tried out an idea that I read on the web, and changed it a little, and I thought it sounded great on my system. So here it is, a nice sounding IC for dirt cheap. Go to the Rat Shack and get their magnet wire pack($2.99). I used the 30ga for mine, but you get 26ga and 22ga spools in the pack so you can use thicker if you like. Go to Lowe's and get the 1/4" polyethylene tubing in the icemaker parts section(25ft for $2.50) Get a couple rolls of teflon tape($1.00). Cut off 1 meter(or what you need for each channel) of tubing. Wrap it with the teflon tape in a spiral. Take your magnet wire and wrap a spiral around the entire length with about 2" spacing(18 turns per meter).Leave a couple inches extending on both ends to solder to the connectors.Then wrap the whole length again with teflon tape as a jacket.Make sure the wire gets covered - no gaps. Then thread another piece of the same guage wire down the tube and out the other end. Leave "tails" on both ends, like before. Solder your favorite RCA plug to each end using the center conductor for signal, and spiral wrapped wire for ground. The ones I used had a spring type strain relief that fit right over the teflon covered tube perfectly and looks professional. Then make one for the other channel. Takes about 2 hours total. They're flexible, sturdy, don't fall apart, look good, and sound real good on my system. Now, you can make your comments about inductance, capacitance, whatever. What we've got here is a good sounding cable with a mild level of RF rejection, teflon dielectric, reasonable spacing between conductors, for a dirt cheap price. I would like an enterprising individual with some good quality cables to make a pair of these and see how they stack up against a good commercial product. Dr. Gizmo, where I got the basic idea from, said that they were better than all his exotic stuff. I don't know about that, but they do sound good on my system. Maybe we could all get lucky and be able to save alot of cash.Probably won't beat Valhalla, but for many of us it might be good enough. Share your thoughts, please. And I would love to hear a report from someone who made them and compared.
twl
This is basically the Chris Venhaus design, which can be found here: http://www.venhaus1.com/diysilverinterconnects.html. This particular recipe uses thin (28 - 32 gauge is recommended) silver wire.
Based on this design, I built an XLR interconnect (the pin1 -> pin1 wire loosly spiralled around the outside) just a few days ago and I'm about to assemble an RCA interconnect as well. And with some braided sleeving to cover it, it looks just as professional as anything out there.
It's not broken in yet (and silver is notorious for being slow at that), but from briefly listening to it, I can say that it sounds at least equal if not better than my HT ProSilway mkII (tad more detailed and extended).
Hi to all!

I've tried a similar recipe too. Wound two magnet wire of 20 (or 18 gauge-not sure) around a polyethilen core in 1.25 inch spacing, used teflon tape, cotton around it, heat shrink tubing, Canare gold plated connectors and ended up with a very "serious" looking cable. But the sound of it isn't what i'd expected. Too dark, not very detailed, bass not very defined, too much of it's own caracter I would say. What is good about it is a pretty expansive(but a bit diffuse) soudstage and pretty "big" (but soft) bass. Might be good for taming a very shrill system.
Perhaps the awg of the wire is to hefty and the main reason for the poor "sound"? Made another pair with smaller distance between wires - but this sounded even worse. Curiously, I found that the directivity with this wire also plays a role. Certainly good for the money, but as well nothing more...
So I continued to use my good old "reference" Monster M1000i cable...

I have posted this as a waypoint to the (possibly) wrong direction - using to much awg wire.
I love "making" cables so I will continue - can't help it!

Best regards,
David.
Which ground wire to use? Will any generic 12 guage wire do the work, or do I need particular wire for the ground?

Ake
Guys, you have to use very small gauge single-conductor wire. 18ga or 20ga is far too large for IC cables. I used 30ga on mine.

Ake, 12 ga is totally out of the question. Use 30ga or smaller.
for some reason I was thinking about the power cord from the same website http://www.venhaus1.com

(had know idea why).

Anyway anyone know about the ground wire used in the powercord project in his website?

sorry for the mixed up.

ake