Pauly,
There is no doubt that Chris vH's braided Cat5 design can produce an outstanding speaker cable ... the only issue for an AKSA being the length that you need to have for your room layout. If it's the normal 5-10' of speaker cable (for a typical "audiophile" setup), you should have no problems.
However, if you go search on Cable Asylum, you will find an interesting set of posts from "Greg Cz" aka "Longcat5" who spent a great deal of time experimenting with different numbers of wires in the braid. His conclusion was that, for his system, 24 wires - ie. 12 '+' and 12 '-' sounded the best.
FYI, at the end of this post, I have pasted in an email he sent me just before Christmas which explains what he did.
My use of a single Cat 5 jacket (8 wires) for '+' and another for '-' was simply to produce an easy, cheap, low capacitance solution to running long wires to speakers in a study, 50' away from the AKSA. The issue here was ... what is "acceptable" not "hi-fi" and the capacitance of CvH's design is such that braiding it would not have been acceptable - to say nothing of being an impossible task (to braid 50'!!).
However, 8 x 24awg strands is the equivalent cross-sectional area of a single 15awg wire which is perfectly acceptable for a 'normal' length speaker cable.
Regards,
Andy
----------------------------------
From Greg Cz:
Andy:
Thinking of posting this message on Christmas eve.
Any thoughts?
"A Christmas Wish from Longcat5"
For the past year I have experimented with various
configurations of Cat5 computer network wire used in
speaker cables. The most intensive portion of my work
with this wire took place in the past four months. It
is a journey that began with 52 stands braided, then
52 strands twisted, 48 strands twisted, 40 stands
twisted, 36 strands twisted, 24 strands twisted and 20
stands twisted.
The thought may entered your mind that I might be the
kind of person who reads phone books for enjoyment and
will spend New Year?s night eagerly watching CSpan.
Perhaps, but through the speaker wire journey I have
learned a number of subtle things. From these
details two facts stand out.
1. If you build speaker wire with Cat5, test before
you construct the cable. Testing will guarantee that
you choose the best wire combination for your
amplifier and speakers. In my case the final choice
in a speaker cable arrived through many, many efforts.
It will be much easier for you through testing.
It would be worth your time do a Search in the Cable
Asylum using, *Longcat5* to find the posts I have made
regarding simple testing procedures (The link listed
below is the first of several Longcat5 posts).
2. Wire is sympathetic to music. That is, wire
bundles vibrate to sound waves. This vibration
creates motor effect, which develops harsh, bright
sound that becomes more fatiguing as volume is raised.
Motor effect can be diminished by adding buffering
materials into the wire bundle. Medium size cotton
knitting thread was my choice.
I reached the conclusion of my wire quest settling on
24 stands (12 positive, 12 negative) buffered with 3
strands of cotton knitting thread. The thread was
twisted into the wire bundles after reaching the eight
wire bundle stage. (Begin constructing the wire with
two pair and twist in the opposite direction of the
manufacturer?s twist, then two groups of four wires
twisted in the opposite direction and finally three
groups twisted in the opposite direction of the
previous twist.) For the final twist a cotton thread
was added to each of the three bundles. Since the
tread is softer than the wire, the thread wound itself
into the bundles in and irregular pattern.
The thread buffering yields a quiet, black background
that music is played against. Gentle detail is
phenomenal between the Musical Fidelity 3.2cr
amplifier and Magneplanar MG12 speakers.
There is such a thing as over damping speaker wire.
I also constructed a 24 wire bundle with 8 threads.
The speaker cable was too dead, akin to sound produced
in an anechoic chamber. This speaker cable might be
effective in very bright sounding systems.
Why 24 stands and not 20? At first 20 strands was a
clear winner over 24. With break-in the story became
clear. The 20 was hyper-detailed, almost surreal in
quality. There was a very slight lisp, a break up, a
sibilance in more intense vocal passages. The message
delivered was not enough wire gauge for the amplifier
to control the speaker elements. Also, bass suffered
a slight reduction in output.
Taking the Cat5 wire challenge can yield phenomenal
speaker cables. This post shares two key elements in
cable design learned through numerous tests over the
period of one year. My Christmas wish is this post to
the Cable Asylum brings you as much joy as the Asylum
experience has brought to me.
What is expense for all this testing? Well, $50 for
500 feet of Belden 1585a, $2 for cotton thread and
time. Of course, the final speaker wire cost a little
more since I added a nice Techflex cover. Audio
heaven does not have to be expensive.
Have a Joyous Christmas and wonderful audio New
Year."
Greg Czarnecki
