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Doubling speaker wire

89grand said:
The math seems off a bit, if the Yamaha can do 260 wpc @ 8 ohms, and 330 wpc @ 4 ohms, for a maximum of 660 watts, then the Belles 400 is 400 total, that's about 1000 watts of potential total output.

Of course, you'd have to be listening to test tones at maximum volume to get that power, which I assume you don't, but that's just a guess.:D

Regardless, that's a lot of amplifier power potential.:yes:
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Don't ya know I'm into "Pink Noise"? ;)

You are right about the Math as I guess I was sort of...the Yammie is 850W into 2 ohms... and yes it can drive it!

•260 Watts (8 ohms) from 20 to 20,000 Hz at no more than 0.003% Total Harmonic Distortion
•295 Watts (6 ohms) from 20 to 20,000 Hz at no more than 0.007% Total Harmonic Distortion
•330 Watts (4 ohms) from 20 to 20,000 Hz at no more than 0.02% Total Harmonic Distortion
•Auto Class A Operating Range, 8 ohms, 30 Watts
•Dynamic Power per channel (IHF) 1 khz:
•8 ohms/6 ohms/4 ohms/2 ohms 430W/510W/660W/850W
 
hopeless said:
Don't have an explanation of why it didn't work for me as speaker cable, but I thought it was nasty.
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Well like I said, I don't have much reference to go on, but it sounds better than 16Ga "zip cord"... and I'm pretty sure I'm delivering some of that current to my speakers! ;)

PS; Yeah, trying to braid this stuff is a waste of time in my book, but then again, very few people read my book!
 
SimplySound said:
Well like I said, I don't have much reference to go on, but it sounds better than 16Ga "zip cord"... and I'm pretty sure I'm delivering some of that current to my speakers! ;)

PS; Yeah, trying to braid this stuff is a waste of time in my book, but then again, very few people read my book!
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I haven't spent a whole lot of time with speaker wire either. I've run some stuff that was not good sounding, but most has been okay. Much less difference than interconnects in my experience. I however, did settle on some Kimber 4TC, which I have run in two runs for biamp applications. I don't intend on spending any more on speaker wire for quite some time.

I may have to try it again for fun. Not like it costs anything. I don't remember what I did to the siamesed set I had before, which was kind of handy. I recently moved and it was nowhere to be found. A lot of stripping.
 
hopeless said:
I thought it sounded terrible. Tried it with siamesed CAT5, but not for long. I spent more time building it than having it in my system. However, CAT5 for interconnect has worked very well for me.

Don't have an explanation of why it didn't work for me as speaker cable, but I thought it was nasty.
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Could be the high capacitance of the cat5 based speaker cable.
 
Power, per se, isn't really that much of a factor in speaker wire gauge unless you have some really big guns.

Example, if you did 500W with continuous test tones at 8 ohms it would be just short of 8 amps. Well within what 16ga wire can handle. Now, consider maxed out with music that 500W amp will only be peak of about 8 amps but average much, much less.
 
Turbo Archie said:
I was just thinking about doing this with 12ga.
Does it help to braid the lines?

I also have 1/0 welding cable I could try..

..
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Braiding doesn't seem to help much when dealing with large gauges, IME. The 1/0 welding cable is about the size of garden hose, mentioned below, and is pretty stout stuff. I'd be much more worried about how you're going to terminate it, and whether it's weight will pull down your amp and speakers!

SimplySound said:
That's what is nice about the CAT5... it is already twisted (and insulated) pairs and the impedence is pretty low. I'll post that link and some pictures of my "assembly" tonight.
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May need to check the specific CAT5 construction as I believe some are made from solid core wire, and a few are made with stranded wire, unbeliveably small.

89grand said:
You can think of speaker wire kind of like a garden hose. If a standard garden hose (16 gauge wire) can flow equal or greater amounts of gallons per minute as the faucet can supply, using a hose twice the size will gain you nothing, except you'll have to lug around a bigger heavier hose.
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Just enough to put out the fire.
 
hopeless said:
That was my original theory, but it just didn't work for me.
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Different amps react differently to different reactive loads, too.

I just use 12awg twisted stranded copper from monoprice. Cheap and effective. But i am Not A Cable Guy.

I don't deny that some cables have slightly different sound, I just think them is some awful expensive tone controls.
 
SimplySound said:
Comon, electrons need room to dance to the music too yanno! :banana:
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I'm all for keeping those electrons jumping.

Noticed you're using Yamaha amp(s). I ran my main+HT system for many years using two M-80s for fronts and center, and two M-40s for surrounds and backs.:thmbsp:
 
whoaru99 said:
Noticed you're using Yamaha amp(s). I ran my main+HT system for many years using two M-80s for fronts and center, and two M-40s for surrounds and backs.:thmbsp:
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Wow... now THAT's (as in "that is") some jumping electrons! Dual M-80's... I'd like to try that some day! I do believe "that is" getting close to "hydrant" mode! :yes:
 
Get out of little league and just run 3-4 of these per speaker.

DSCF0454.jpg
 
89grand said:
Get out of little league and just run 3-4 of these per speaker.

DSCF0454.jpg
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Why is a length heavy braided copper speaker wire not inductive and a crossover coil is very much so:scratch2:. I've opened of speakers that have relatively large amounts, similar to keychain lanterns, of twisted internal wire leading to individual drivers.
I suppose the answer is obvious:)
 
tubed said:
Why is a length heavy braided copper speaker wire not inductive and a crossover coil is very much so:scratch2:. I've opened of speakers that have relatively large amounts, similar to keychain lanterns, of twisted internal wire leading to individual drivers.
I suppose the answer is obvious:)
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Only one wire creates an inductor, so a typical +/- speaker wire both coiled cannot create inductance.

Now, if you had two separate wires, and the one going to the positive lead was coiled (in such a way as to create inductance) and the negative was flat, then yes, there would be some degree of inductance.:yes:
 
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I'm a believer that thicker wire makes a difference, I hear the difference, And I don't think I'm delusional.
 
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