There's no denying they look great and can really bring an attention to detail to your system that you wouldn't otherwise have. Unfortunately there is no easy fix for this situation as it will require you to un-braid the entire cable and replace the bad wire. You can do this by simply holding the gold connector portion tightly and unscrewing the silver barrel from it. (3) If your wires test good it's time to hook them up to your system and test them out! As long as your wires are at maximum 24AWG you should be fine. (1) Look at the ends of the paracord, you'll see that the end have been fused already to prevent fraying, using a pair of scissors, cut off the fusing from both ends of the paracord. The resistivity of 24 AWG copper wire is 85 ohms per kilometer of wire. I just found materials to copy the look and function of the high end stuff like you did. long wires are already great inductors, by introducing excessive capacitance, you create a LC circuit which is not usually "tuned" to a frequency you actually want to listen to. So don’t waste any money “solving” this problem with intricately braided speaker cables. Question (1) First twist the ends of your wires so the matching colors are twisted together like picture 2. I personally prefer a 4 wire braid as I believe it looks the best, this is the method I will be demonstrating in this how-to, but as always you're free to use any method of braiding that you can think of! Or using more wires per cable will allow you to make your own wires for PA systems or systems that deliver thousands of watts of power. I really like how your cables turned out they're very clean ! It should look like picture 16 when completed. - 72' of paracord in various colors ($8 Walmart)- 25' of 16 AWG 3 conductor extension cable ($9 Walmart)- 8 banana plugs ($16 Amazon)- a large assortment of heat shrink tubing in the color of your choice ($5 Amazon). Yours stated with 12.5 ' wires - how long is the finished braided cable?Thanks!! This guide will take you from start to finish through the process of building your own DIY, braided, multi-strand speaker interconnects like the ones shown above. Take your barrels off of your connectors by just simply unscrewing them off. On a related note, is there a difference between using a wire thats made of a single strand of copper (or whatever) VS a wire that's made of hundreds of fine stands twisted together? Most of the best speaker wires are made from copper, since copper is a wonderful conductor of electricity. diy-cat5-speaker-cable.jpg DIY CAT5 Speaker Cables 11419 views DIY Speaker Cables made using Category 5 (CAT5) network wire. Just unthread them out just far enough that it will allow you to slide the speaker wire in through the bottom. 1. Inside the extension cable you will see three 16 AWG wires, these wires will become our speaker cables. 5 years ago (3) Once the inner wires are free from the outer casing, you'll notice that the inner wires are loosely twisted together. : Welcome to my Instructable on how to make your own high end audio interconnects! This will prevent the wire from catching on the paracord and make sliding the paracord over it much easier. on Step 10, Have you measured some parameters of your cables? Start by twisting one end of the line together making sure that the line is even when you start twisting the copper wiring together. Connect with our Audio Gurus at 800-FATWYRE or 215-862-4870 or Send email or use Contact form. Next round use copper braid ground around each cable and a flexible clear shrink tubing and you will have a beautiful and clean sounding creation! Since I will be making two cables, I will need 8 conductors total, so I folded the black and white wires in half and cut them. Oxygen-Free. Now it is time to cover out wires with the paracord we prepped earlier. Anyway, my takeaway was that maybe a very experienced critical listener using high end audiophile equipment could benefit from expensive high end wires, but for most of us simply upgrading to modestly priced higher gauge (>14g) pure copper cables will give us the best results. Reply It's axiomatic that your audio system is only as good as its weakest link and it's the speaker cables and interconnects … heres an idea, why dont you connect the made wire to the last piece of paracord strand that has to be pulled out anyway and PULL the made up wires through, its waaaayyyyy easier and waaaayyyy less frustrating. Nice keyboard :) Project is fine, but I would rather use some OFC audio wire instead, at least. This will cause the inner copper wire strands to poke out and catch on the paracord, making sliding it over the wire impossible. More expensive cables have the outermost layer of insulation tightly formed around the inner conductors, this will be much more difficult to remove. You now should be an expert at braiding, and will welcome the fact that you have only 2 more braids to do. Welcome to my Instructable on how to make your own high end audio interconnects! All of us could definitely hear a difference when going to pure copper oxygen free cable from a standard cable within the same gauge. This means that it's rated to 550Lbs, which is quite impressive in itself. It's very important to cut both ends or else this next step will not work. This is 1/4" sized heat shrink and works great for sealing your cable ends, strengthening them, and giving them a nice and professional finished look. The… Ever wanted really nice speaker wire, but didn't want to spend the big money? The results were very interesting. I will be using banana plugs in this how to as all of my equipment has 5-way binding posts. What about the DC rezistance, parallel capacitance or series inductance? Take the negative (-) line, which is silver in this wire set, and the positive (+) line, which is gold colored and tear them apart. (3) Now eyeball about how much wire will be consumed by the banana plug, mark the paracord at this spot. I need to know how much extra length is required by the braiding. Also don't forget the right size shrink tube. (5) Now slide a medium sized piece of heat shrink over both of the wires, do not shrink this yet. Warm up the end of the wire until it begins to melt, then roll the melted end of the wire between your fingers or on the table to form a rounded end. Along with our DIY speaker cables, many of our readers and egroup members have been building interconnects out of CAT 5 cable. Share it with us! Just to be clear, my definition of a DIY speaker cable would be the later … This is major overkill, and frankly totally unnecessary, but the thick wires look much nicer than thin wires and they fit perfectly into the paracord. If there is a drain wire … Strip 3/4" sheathing from the wire ends and join matching colors. You can save this if you'd like, as it is very strong and will make an excellent rope. No twists, braids or anything. (1) First, grab your extension cable and cut off the plugs on the ends. Basically, it covers a range of frequencies with ease and efficiency. Jan 19, 2019 - Make Your Own "audiophile" Quality Speaker Cables! You want the high end wires because of their amazing looks and designs, but you don't want to be the fool who spends $500 on speaker wires when regular wire will work just fine. 5 years ago. Some times cheaply made terminals and connectors can have an oxide layer that would prevent a good connection. -try to use a heat gun if you have access to one, the lighter can be a bit difficult to use without melting the paracord or burning the heat shrink.-Use the smallest pieces of heat shrink that will comfortably slide over the wires for each step, this will make the termination stronger and less likely to break with time. I keep them well separated along the entire runs. on Step 10. You can see how the heat shrink forms around the connector and the speaker wire beautifully and creates a nice seal to prevent oxidization of any exposed copper wire and will make your cables stronger and more durable. One length is for your … I know! Now we must turn our attention to the paracord, the specific type of paracord I will be using in this Instructable is called paracord 550. About: I'm a university student from the good ol' USA! (6) Slide on the outer casing of your terminals as far down as it will go. Then pull the three conductors out, the outer insulation should just tear cleanly as you pull. The manufacturers emphasize oxygen-free because speaker cables have a tendency to corrode with enough exposure to oxygen. With speaker wires, bare wire terminations are generally better than using termination lugs. However, its coverage is so skimpy, that it's always struck me as useless. Then attach the rest of your terminal to the bare twisted wires. Heat shrink here will also give your cables a more professional finished look. 5 Audioholic Field Marshall. Take your terminals and clean them with some isopropyl alcohol. For this project I will be using 4, 16AWG wires for each cable, two for the positive side and two for the negative side. This will make removing the banana plugs harder but it will ensure a perfect electrical connection. This guide will take you from start to finish through the process of building your own DIY, braided, multi-strand speaker interconnects like the ones shown above. Reply (4) When complete you should be left with a huge ball of nylon core and an equally large ball of colored paracord outer shells. But what if you just want them because they look cool? The gauge of the wire is a measure of how thick the wire is. Speaker wire comes in different thicknesses, most commonly ranging from 12 gauge to 18 gauge (this can also be written as 12 AWG to 18 AWG). Simply pull this nylon core out of the paracord, it's not held in place by anything and should easily slide right out. I will be pointing out some tips I learned along the way so you don't have to make the same mistakes that I did. https://diyaudioprojects.com/Power/Low-Inductance-DIY-Speaker-Cables I will be adding banana plugs, and the type of banana plugs I will be using only require a small flat-head screwdriver to attach. Mine simply required that I tighten down a small grub screw to hold the wires in place. If you're like most people you may be asking what is so special about these wires that lets them charge $500?! Impossible, only the level can be affected, not the quality, capacitance and inducion are far too small to be relevant. $15.99 $ 15. When you say DIY speaker cable is it safe to assume you mean just terminating an already available Bulk wire of some flavor? just fyi, twisting the cable like that will actually degrade the audio quality of a long speaker wire, and can cause your amplifier to oscillate badly. The… This is fantastic! Watch video How To Make Bi-wire or Bi-amping Your custom sound/audio speakers cables. The resultant speaker cables and interconnects made from this wire … What's The Deal With Audio Cables? Do It Yourself DIY guide to speaker Cables made. 10 months ago TO SKIP ALL OF THIS AND BUY THESE CABLES FOR CHEAP WITH FREE SHIPPING FROM MY STORE...JUST CLICK HERE! I practiced on some spare wires and I still had to restart one of my braids because I skipped a step by accident. As always you should always test the integrity of your connections using a multimeter, before you attach them to your valuable stereo system. on Introduction. I plan to make similar braided cables to yoursthat need to end up 32 feet long. Do not exceed this number when picking a wire gauge. We used about fifteen or twenty different cables all the way from from 18g lamp wire to high-end silver audiophile cables costing several hundred dollars. This guide will take you from start to finish through the process of building your own DIY, braided, multi-strand speaker interconnects like the ones shown above. It’s encased in #550 Paracord. Participated in the DIY Audio and Music Contest. Make sure to check that there are no shorts between the negative and positive wires for each cable. Looks rediculous that someone criticize branded cables and put worst shyte wire in fancy cloth hahaha...Whats the point? The Cat5 cables are braided together as shown in the photo and terminated using banana plugs. But like I said, there was a lot of disagreement and the only real loser was the host whose two cables consistently performed in the bottom half of the higher gauge cables. (2b) If your terminals look ok remove them and check the resistance of the wires you are using. It's quite annoying to have to re-tape the wires because they detached from the table mid-braid. This is because as you are inching the paracord down the length of the wire it will also inch the wire's outer insulation down the inner conductor a bit too. I use 30ga solid-core copper wire with no shield for my 1 meter interconnects, and 22ga solid-core copper wire for the 3 meter speaker cables. You can use several thin wires and have the same effect, so long as the equivalent gauge is no larger than 24AWG. I don't feel so bad anymore, I did the same thing. I recommend twisting the wires together again while the final piece of heat shrink is still hot, this will allow it to hold the twisted shape better. Simply only use two of the three conductors. One of mine craft. It's sad really, though it's still available online so I might place an order as they're are no Radioshacks anywhere near me anymore :(. The number of wires per cable will directly affect how the final product looks, there are countless ways to weave and braid wires together. Please NOTE: Bulk Cables are excluded from our Free Shipping program. (2) You will notice a few strands of nylon thread in the core of the paracord, this is what gives the paracord it's strength, but it is also in the way of where we want to put our wire. You'll notice that as it stands there aren't enough conductors to complete two cables, that's perfectly alright. Also note that ultra low price speaker wire (such as Amazon Basics) is copper-clad aluminum, and is only about 2/3 as efficient as oxygen-free copper. Do remember to budget for the lengths of speaker wire that you need (and the number of speakers you're wiring-up if it's a surround system) and bear in mind that the cable prices we quote usually don't include the banana plugs that you'll see in the pictures, largely because you don't necessarily have to buy them. Then slide the already shrunk heat shrink tubing down the length of the wire an inch or so to make room to attach the terminals. However the cheapest and easiest method is always leaving the wires bare. Did you make this project? If the wires check out alright move onto step (2c). j_garcia Audioholic Jedi. The idea is that this wire, which is braided with or wrapped around the other two, acts as a shield and drains away any stray magnetism caused by the interaction of the principal conductors. If you're going to invest this much effort into something a simple as a speaker wire, you might as well make it perfect :)- Put several pieces of duct tape down to hold the wires to the table you're working on. I've even noticed this in medium quality home and car systems. I've always been a maker, I love applying the things I learn in school to my projects, and lea…, Real VO2Max--Measure Your Athletic Potential, Simple Extruded Aluminum Frame for LED Panels. The resistance values should be very low, if you see a value that is anything above 1 ohm that is cause for concern and means that there is a bad connection somewhere. I've built several sets of these myself and found their sound to be very good. Technically it's called PET expandable jacket.http://www.amazon.com/PET-Expandable-Braided-Sleeving-Color/dp/B00BM80FKY, but you can Google for more. a search for "oxygen free" on Radioshack's site yields no hits. This will help remove the oxidation layer, if that doesn't work a solvent like DeOxit should be your best bet at easily removing oxidation. Several amps circulate in a speaker cable, how could such a strong signal could be affected by "interferences" of micro or nanoamps ? (7) Slide the small heat shrink tubing and the paracord up until it meets the base of the terminal. It will be difficult to fix any issues once the cables are completed so double check everything now. Answer See pics below. Well done and thank you! Question I am not sure how much capacitance you need to cause trouble, but it would vary with any higher frequency noise around to pick up. Instead of your easily influenced ear, try with an oscilloscope. You can get different patterns also, not just black. If the resistance of the wires is still high, that means you might have a bad conductor. (9) Repeat these steps for all 8 of the terminals. For a speaker setup generally anything 24AWG or lower is fine. And by someone with EE knowledge!! This is how long the leads will be on the end of the cable. But I do respect the fact that this is for looks. One possible use for these cables is a Bi-amp setup. Monoprice typically has good quality OFC lamp cord for a reasonable price. 15th February 2021 In Uncategorised. I had a large roll of 18 gauge wire so I braided together 4 lengths for each speaker. Or you could recycle it. I might be under the influence of the audiophile Kool-Aid but using the wires from a cheap extention cord that I would use with my dads old electric powertools, I don't know but wouldn't it be prone to interference and such resulting in sound quality issues? for this same reason you are mentioning, you do not want to stick caps across audio cables as a filter- use inductance instead. The test was performed using a very nice Yamaha system with JBL monitors... nice, but not necessarily audiophile. Now braid the last three together. Hi. (4) Now, using your knife cut through the paracord, and heat shrink tubing like in the 8th image. then put some heat shrink tubing so it covers this spot and shrink it down. As always I cannot stress enough that these cables will not change the sound of your stereo, these are meant for decorative purposes only. Feb 4, … A bi-amp setup is where two independent amplifiers are used to drive one speaker. 4 days ago. Hey I really like the look of the speaker wire inside those sleeves, you don't happen to have a link to it do you? this is the diameter of a solid wire or how many individual copper strands are in a stranded wire. 8 months ago Some important things to keep in mind during this phase are: - Overall length needed- Style of cable (braided, twisted, heat shrunk, sleeved etc. The answer is to build your own! You may choose any method of coloration, some have even used Teflon tape as a way of turning their entire cable a pristine white color. Monoprice Premium Braided Speaker Wire 14AWG - With Gold Plated Banana Plug … These can be saved for a future project if you like. This simple design is cheap and will allow you to make whatever custom cables you want for much less than it would cost to buy them.I hope you have enjoyed my Instructable, this is my first post in many many years and I would love to hear your feedback! There are tons of different ways you could weave your cables together, unfortunately I am not good with complex braiding techniques, so I opted for a very simple 4 strand braid. Then slide the medium sized piece of heat shrink up and shrink it. Make sure the tubing is completely shrunk all the way. Or Are you talking about constructing your own cable from individual bare legs of copper wire and then twisting, shielding, jacketing and terminating the whole bundle yourself? Once the wires have been completely braided all of the way down, un-braid the first and last 5" of cable and twist the like-colored wires together. Then I though that since the wire pairs run rather loosely inside the outer covering, how would they test out if I made speaker cables using the entire package? Using thin flexible wires will allow you to make custom headphone cables for headphones with removable wires. The speaker wire delivers great bass, higher imaging, and cleaner tonality highs. Auvio 12awg. Strip the ends of the wires and twist them together. You must consider what you want the final product to look like and what things you absolutely need to have. ----- Original Message -----From: John … There were several audio professionals and enthusiasts that also participated. GearIT 14AWG Premium Heavy Duty Braided Speaker Wire Cable (6 Feet) Dual Gold Plated Banana Plug Tips - in-Wall CL2 - Oxygen-Free Copper (OFC) Black. I’ve been looking at the knuconceptz 3D braided speaker wire and considering it for a set of speakers. (5) Now bearing in mind that each finished cable will use 4 wires, determine how many wires you will need to make the amount of cables you wish to end up with in the end. Also opt for 3:1 heat shrink instead of 2:1. That's right, electrically these $500 speaker cables are no different from a $30 roll of speaker wire from Walmart. Use your wire cutters or scissors to cut the wires here. (4) Now untwist the wires from each other and separate them by color. The wire is on sale, it's radio shacks premium brand. on Step 10. Connect your favorite flavor banana plug or neutrik connector to one end (if your running a pro audio amp) and whatever device the speaker requires for the other. I will be saving the green wires for another project in the future so I did not cut them in half, but if you did you could make three speaker cables from just one extension cable. Single conductor run for each. If you're unsure of what kind of termination to use, check the wires that are already on your system now and use the same style of termination that is already on them. If someone can show me the difference on a short length cable, I swear I'll serve him the rest of my life. The cheaper cables are easier to disassemble cleanly. Insert the speaker wire into the opening and then tighten down the thumbscrew. One amp takes care of the low frequencies and one amp takes care of the high frequencies. Fold this in half and cut it, this should leave you with 6x 12.5' conductors. If your cables don't work well refer to the procedure listed in steps (2b) and (2c). Remember this was done in a blind A-B test and the results were almost unanimous. Do you know if there are any "rules of thumb" for where capacitance becomes a problem? 4.5 out of 5 stars 685. Attach the positive and negative terminals to their appropriate points and fire up some tunes! Did something similar but took a different direction. Enjoy! Using multiple lengths of thinner wire can allow a cable to be more flexible and still be used in high wattage setups. Try to narrow down which wire it is by using your meter. The tape will hold the paracord on the wire while we are braiding the strands later. It should be noted that a general rule is that when two equal gauge wires are used in parallel the equivalent gauge is the gauge of one wire minus three.