No one actually knows how to lculate what speaker cable they need

Mr. glupson

1.       "How thin is that last connecting piece on the 0 AWG wire allowed to be before it can be considered a fuse?"

The 0 AWG is not for the current. It is for low resistance to match the relative low resistance of the amp. (DF). Some short and not so thin (I always repeated to use as thick as possible) wires at the end, won't change the cables resistance by much. Even a 12-14 AWG is no fuse. Most speaker cables on the market today are about that thick.

 

2.       My two cents on fuse in Audio:

I don't think that on the amp – speaker's path, a fuse is a good idea. I would rather prefer some sought of electronic protection in the amp. This whole thread is about minimizing the resistance of that loop, so a fuse will not do well to that.

That fuse you are talking about, what is its purpose? To protect the amp from short circuit or to protect the speakers from a faulty amp.?

Most damage to speakers is caused by using a low power amp. that might go over derived (volume) to get it play louder. When that happens the amp. might go into clipping (saturation). That’s a situation when it runs from positive to negative saturation, causing a very steep transient (dv/dt) that has a nature of high frequency and high energy. The speaker's cross over passes it to the tweeter, that in no way can handle it and its very thin wire coil, fries. A fuse in series with the speaker wire won't protect your tweeters from that.

Most of my systems since I'm in this hobby, never had a fuse on the audio path. On the mains supply: yes.

b4icu,

I was not talking about real fuse or about placing one anywhere. It was a hypothetical question "how thin does the connecting wire have to be before it is called a fuse?". It may not be 12-14 AWG, but at what AWG would it be? Now, when I think about it, that is the question that could probably be answered with a  calculation. Not by me, but by some reasonably experienced electrical engineer.

"This whole thread is about minimizing the resistance of that loop, so a fuse will not do well to that."

and

"Some short and not so thin (I always repeated to use as thick as possible) wires at the end, won't change the cables resistance by much."

I fully understand what you mean by both statements, but also do notice that you decide to downplay/ignore ("won't change by much") increased resistance on one part while considering the resistance of the other significant. At the same time, both of those resistances cannot be that huge and that is what your "opponents" claim.

Mr. glupson

How does it work in engineering:

Most times when values are minor regarding the other major circuit values, they tend to be ignored. Otherwise, it may complicate a lot the calculations. When it must be meticulously engineered (NASA, military, medical life saving etc’) no short cuts are allowed.

If you would like to dig into it, the path between the amplifier’s power supply back to ground, through the speaker cables and the speaker components, could be represented by a series of resistors (in the speaker there are also non resistive elements, as capacitors and coils). R=R1+R2+R3…+Rn. https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/resistor/res_3.html

That would also apply to the cable part as a standalone.

Each piece in that puzzler equals to some R:

· The banana plug contact area with the binding post’s,

· The banana plug itself,

· The short cable between that plug and the 0 AWG cable,

· The two connections: between the banana and the short cable,

· The short cable with the 0 AWG, to be applied in both ends (added twice).

On top, the R should be doubled, as we have two cables per channel: the red and the black.

For some you might need to do a measurement as it might be impossible to calculate.

For some reason, you are now digging into the most minor details of a 0 AWG cable, at a time before this thread, all were good so with a 12-14 AWG cables!

I’ve been following this thread since the beginning and have been sitting on the sidelines questioning myself if I should participate or not. I am not a EE nor do I play one on TV but I like many here have been in this hobby most of my life. I’ve learned a lot over the years, and much has been pure snake oil and some tweaks that appeared to be off the wall have me further pursuing this hobby I have spent some forty years playing with.

I’ve learned a lot of things just can’t be measured or be proven by any equipment, logic or math but my ears tell me otherwise. Maybe I’m the fool with a decent enough income to play along... I don’t know and really I don’t care. I know what I like and that’s all that matters to me.

I’m sure I’ve missed a few post and honestly I’m not going to spend the time to read through all this again but I do believe it’s only fair to hear for oneself if there’s an improvement to ones system regarding the OP’s claim. My short research on the cable most often suggested does not seem to be expensive so why not see or hear. I really don’t care about whether or not there really is or is not a secret formula, but maybe it’s just a gut instinct the OP persues. From what I’ve read no one can really argue b4icu doesn’t have some smarts or maybe just spends a ton of time researching things on the internet and post the links back to us;,my guess he has a background in math and EE above mine so I’m smart enough not to get in a pissing contest.

OK... enough jibber jabber from me. I want to participate and I give my word to b4icu I will buy and build these cables and give you my honest opinion of them on my system and I will compare them to the two cable brands that anyone here can go to my profile to see what I have and my associated equipment. My gear is decent and although not as costly as many here I do have a good ear and I am a musician so I know what to listen for or knows what many instruments sound like on stage.

Before I throw out my amp, speakers and length of I do have a question that maybe has already been asked, but as I stated I’m not going to go back and read through all these post so please forgive me if it’s been mentioned several times. I am curious with such a large cable running the + and - parralel to each other not being twisted around each other is there any concern of these becoming an antenae basically picking up nearby radio stations - RF/EMI? I would think it’s possible. I know as a kid back in the 80s I had a speaker cable that was not twisted or braided that did just that.

I have a Pass Labs X250 amp not a .5 or .8 and I believe the DF is 250. My speakers are Aerial Acoustics 7B’s and my speaker cables are 8ft long per side. I biwire at the speakers only with wire jumpers, so my cables are not configured for biwire. As mentioned above I will build the cables, which I’ve built many cables over the years so I will be careful and not blow anything up. As mentioned earlier I was thinking why use a block or make a pigtail to connect to spades or bananas but just cut back the strands 6” or so from the end before termination... why have anything to degrade the signal?

I look forward to your response on size of cable to proceed and it has to be a 8ft pair please so my comparison between my two other cable brands is fair. I will likely try the experiment cables with the stock speaker biwire metal straps and the two other brands of jumpers I have. In closing I am curious if you have any concerns with RF/EMI and if you do not I would appreciate your response why. Again if the subject of RF/EMI has already been discused I do apologize.