Anyone else making their own cables?


Over the years I have owned a lot of different brands of very sought after and very expensive cables(interconnections both balanced and single ended and speaker cables). Each time selling and then trying another. I recently have been experimenting with making my own. I have been doing a lot of reading on the subject of design. Also I have been dissecting some old inexpensive ones I had lying around. I am starting with ic's. From my experience and what I have read, when done right balanced is the superior method. What I had not realized is that single ended cables can be balanced as well. In fact Annolog(vinyl) starts out as balanced. This is the way I have chosen to make my cables. Also I have found that grounding at the receiving end and simply connecting the grounds at the sending side works best and in my view is the only real reason for directional cables. I have been using wbt and eichmann ends. I would like to hear from others with knowledge of design, cable types and materials, soldering, end type(brands) and their benefits and covers to improve final appearance. I would also be interested in any other point I have not mentioned or to simply disagree with any assertion I or anyone else makes on this subject. I do realize that cables are the single most controversial subject in this hobby. I am not trying to settle that argument. Just offer another option. It may even prove cheaper to buy a brand cable then make your own. I do not have a degree in engerneering nor am I an electrician or computer genius. Just a long time audiophile. My single ended cables are for vinyl set up(turntable to step up transformer to phono stage). Balanced everywhere else. My system is fully balanced(as earlier described) from end to end. Thanks for informative insights.
128x128pkoegz
Since I am so ignorant of the technical details of electrical or electronics that I still don't understand the difference between chassis ground, circuit ground, and signal ground, I am very hesitant to suggest that Al may not be 100% correct. However, fools rush in, so please take this with a grain of salt...

While there may be a pro audio standard for how XLR plugs and jacks are wired, I believe that there is no absolute standard in consumer audio equipment. Some audio gear uses a different pin out/in. I had an Electrocompaniet EMC-1 CDP that was wired differently and so I had to have custom-wired XLR cables made up.

Also, remember that some equipment has XLR jacks and/or plugs, but the circuits they tie to are not true balanced circuits. In that case, the jacks or plugs function as adapters.

I hope that Al (Hi, guy, get much snow?) or someone else will correct me if I am wrong.
Hi Michael (Swampwalker),

I don't see any inconsistency between our two posts.

Regarding the EMC-1 you had, equipment that is made in some European and Asian countries sometimes applies the non-inverted signal in the balanced signal pair to XLR pin 3, and the inverted signal to pin 2, rather than the opposite which is the usual convention in the USA and many other countries. In those cases, to maintain correct polarity/absolute phase, if one considers that to be audibly significant (and if one is using multiple sources, so that absolute phase cannot be restored by swapping + and - at the amplifier outputs or the speaker terminals), the cable would have to connect pin 2 at one end to pin 3 at the other end, and vice versa.

I suspect that is what you are referring to. If not, and if pin 1 were used for a signal connection, that would have been really oddball, and incompatible with conventionally designed cables and components.

Re your last question, fortunately and surprisingly Snowmaggedon didn't materialize down here. Only about 8 inches so far. Seems like the storm moved further east than expected, and eastern MA and southeastern NH are having the worst of it.

Best,
-- Al
If I can jump in on the topic, I don't believe the OP meant that single-ended cables can transfer a signal in the same way a balanced cable does, or that single-ended cables can interface between two balanced components, but rather that the design of a signal ended cable is sometimes referred to as a balanced design in cases where the positive and negative conductors are of the same type and gauge, and treated the same geometrically. This is most prevalent as a twisted pair type cable, most often made with a separate braided ground shield that is only connected at the source end. This type of single-ended cable is in contrast to those where the positive and negative conductors are dissimilar, such as in coaxial cables where the braid shield also serves as the ground/return conductor.
Thanks, Tim (Mitch2). Well said, as always. After re-reading PKoegz's posts I suspect that you are right. If so, my suggestion would be that it would be better to refer to such cables as having a symmetrical pair of conductors, or something to that effect. Or perhaps saying that they employ symmetrical construction, or perhaps even that they employ balanced construction. Saying that some "single-ended cables are balanced" seems like an oxymoron.

Best regards,
-- Al
Hi Al- Not really on-topic but no, the EMC-1 did not have inverted phase, it flat out did not work w conventionally wired XLR cables. No sound. Nada.