Speaker Cables, One side longer- bad idea?

Oh, I went back and read the beginning of your first post Bwhite. Attribution?

Attribution: I am not certain who wrote the document although it is as I stated, "interesting reading". Audiogon's new forum format doesn't allow for placing a URL or a link inside of a post so...I was unable to do that as a means to send readers to the actual online document.

I am at work now and the bookmark is saved on my home computer. I will post the URL this evening when I get home so that others can read the original document and indulge in some of the other rants on the webpage.

So this means I can't move my head anymore when I listen. Not one millionth of a centimetre, I gather, Well, hum... Let's see, how about a head vise (no not lice) with laser level type things to make sure the well seated (and heeled) audiophile does not move and consequently lose any of the phase accuracy of his interconnects, speakers or of his equally expensive (or more expensive is even better) speaker wires. Never mind subwoofers, there's nothing down there any ways, but 12 K cables get the imaging just right, not to mention inner detail and the greater distance between musicians in the orchestra. Magnificent, great I can hear the rosin on the bow now... it's, it's, it's in phase! Glory be to the small, dishonest, inefficient manufacturers for in these anti-scientific times, they shall rule the biz.

I may be wrong, but I always thought the standard argument supporting equal cable length had less to do with signal delay as it did with inductance, reactance, and capacitance (those terms could be wrong, it's been a few years since I stumbled through E&M). I know that for direct current a solid conductor with uniform cross section has resistance proportional to length (and inverself proportional to cross section area). As such a 60% increase in length seems like it would have fairly measurable effects on the current. I know that this is a not quite correct, complete oversimplification of the argument, but I think it's along those lines. Anyway, the final measure of course is what you can hear. Perhaps a good experiment would involve getting a ridiculously different lengths of zip wire and seeing if that makes a difference.

Raguirre, yes, as Marakanetz said above, RLC, resistance, inductance and capacitance will vary with length, or so I have been told. The question is by how much and what effect that would have on the sound. If something goes up by 50% from .011 to .016 whatever the units are (not 1.1 % distortion to 1.6, that would be audible and not what I mean,) will you hear a difference? I think not.

Now, with ridiculously different lengths of zip wire you may hear a difference because, and I rely on what others have told me since I am not an engineer, zip wire has higher measured inductance and capacitance.

The best reasons for keeping equal lengths are flexibility in rearranging your furniture and resale value. Very hard to sell mismatched cables.