[Escott1377]

I am going to need make an extension cable for the new pair of headphones that I ordered.

4 conductors, 2 wired together for each can?

Do I want to use a braid or litz or does it matter?

Is shielding required?

If Litz, anyone have a good resource for small gauge litz wire?

I can't find a good recipe online.

Thanks in advance -

[FullRangeMan]

You dont need shielding, how long you need?
PM member Jeff from Sonic Craft for a quality cable:
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?board=201.0
If hp use detachable cable made a new quality cable, avoid extensions.

[Escott1377]

I know Sonic Craft and that is where I buy my materials.

The Litz they offer is OCC w/ a cotton wrap.

I can email him, but wanted to try on my own since it is just selecting the right cable and some soldering.

Heat shrink and tech flex just make it look nicer.

[Armaegis]

Don't worry about shielding, don't worry about litz.

If using four separate wires: The usual braiding technique is a simple two strand winding (do not "twist" wires like with a drill) at each earcup, and join into a 4-strand round braid down below. Lots of videos online on how to do the braid, but don't pull the wires too tight or bend them sharply.

If you buy wire that has two conductors each, it's even easier and practically no braiding required. Send a single wire to each cup and simply twist down below; hold the top of the twist together with some glue/tape/heatshrink or buy a splitter.

[Escott1377]

Don't worry about shielding, don't worry about litz.

If using four separate wires: The usual braiding technique is a simple two strand winding (do not "twist" wires like with a drill) at each earcup, and join into a 4-strand round braid down below. Lots of videos online on how to do the braid, but don't pull the wires too tight or bend them sharply.

If you buy wire that has two conductors each, it's even easier and practically no braiding required. Send a single wire to each cup and simply twist down below; hold the top of the twist together with some glue/tape/heatshrink or buy a splitter.

Any recommended gauge or combined gauge w/ the braid?  Thanks -

[Nick77]

Talk to Jeff at Sonicraft, he does carry small gauge Cardas litz wire but it is tough to work with, you have to sand off the enamel and tin.

[DaveC113]

I don't like combining R and L channels in one braid, I make a 4-strand braid of UPOCC copper litz for each channel and keep them separate from one another. It's overkill, resulting in 17g/leg total, but it does work very well. Braiding this wire is a bit more difficult but not that hard.

I have my own version of the Neotech 20g UPOCC copper litz wire, it's a little better and is black/white instead of red/black. This wire was specifically designed for headphone use and no surprise it works great for single drivers and hi-eff speakers, especially with simple crossovers.

It's not that hard to tin, what I do is coat the strands with paste flux and twist tightly, then solder. You can also wrap the bundle of litz wire with a small wire, ~30g or so, and twist with pliers to compact the litz strands as much as possible, I do this with larger gauges. The enamel burns off so make sure your ventilation is good, a solder fume trap isn't good enough. It's a PITA vs regular wire but it's worth it, and not that difficult once you get the hang of it.

[Tyson]

Why even braid at all?  What's the benefit?  Seems like a lot of extra work....

[DaveC113]

Why even braid at all?  What's the benefit?  Seems like a lot of extra work....

It improves the spatial relationship between signal and ground wires, sounds significantly better.

[Armaegis]

Any recommended gauge or combined gauge w/ the braid?  Thanks -

For headphones you don't need much. Weight/flexibility will be greater factors than gauge.

Why even braid at all?  What's the benefit?  Seems like a lot of extra work....

Also it just keeps the wires neat if you don't have sleeving.

[FullRangeMan]

Why even braid at all?  What's the benefit?  Seems like a lot of extra work....

Before sound quality was a momentum subject in magazines, twisted wires was used to shield the cable against interference.

[Speedskater]

Why even braid at all?  What's the benefit?  Seems like a lot of extra work....

Adding extra work is the main idea.
It may add better handling, flexibility and robustness.
As to audible differences between braided and twisted. There are none.

[DaveC113]

Adding extra work is the main idea.
It may add better handling, flexibility and robustness.
As to audible differences between braided and twisted. There are none.

^Comment made without any experience or testing at all.   

[Escott1377]

These are the headphones that I settled on.

http://theheadphonelist.com/headphone-review/hifiman-560-review-new-benchmark/

Looks like they use coax connectors into the cans??

Anyone have a quality source for coax?  I checked Sonic Craft and then Parts Express.

From what I have read, i need 2 conductors per can and then the 4 connectors will be brought into the 1/4" plug to terminate (?).

I typically use OCC solid copper or silver for braiding cables.  Any benefit to the higher priced silver?  The only silver I have right now is from table to phono pre.

Thanks in advance -

[FullRangeMan]

Silver has better sound than copper if are hi purity-expensive, low grade silver wire has worse sound than copper. As silver has a tendency to emphasize treble I think HPs dont need silver cables they already have enough hi freq imo.

[DaveC113]

It looks like they are Sennheiser connectors:

http://www.furutech.com/2013/03/19/6090/

If you have UPOCC silver, that's about as expensive as it gets and is the best of the best imo. I can get the connectors if you want, shoot me a pm if interested.

FRM, the big advantage of silver is the increased resolution, UPOCC silver minimizes the emphasis on high frequencies, it's very neutral.

[Tyson]

It improves the spatial relationship between signal and ground wires, sounds significantly better.

So, I'm thinking of building out a headphone cable for my Beyer T1's.  Right now I have the stock cable on there, which is about 10 feet, and then I have an "extender" cable that's another 10 feet.  I need 20 feet of cable to reach from my headphone amp to my couch.  I thought I'd just replace the stock cable with a better DIY cable, make it 20 feet long so no need for an extender.  I plan to use 24 gauge OCC wire from VH Audio:

https://www.vhaudio.com/unicrystal-cu-airlok-single.html

So if I do a braid, would it need to be 2 positive wires and one ground wire per earcup/side?  or 1 positive wire and 2 ground wires?  Do the ground wires need to be as high-quality as the signal wires?  Or can I use cheaper wires for that?

[DaveC113]

For the braid I use 2 ground and 2 signal wires in a 4-strand braid for each channel. HP is more like a speaker cable, you want it to be symmetric/even between signal and ground like a speaker cable.

24g UPOCC copper is good but the airlok dielectric isn't a good choice for headphone cables imo, it's very soft and can be stripped with your fingernails. In this case you're probably better off using teflon insulation, it's much harder and more durable. Also, solid core wire is nice but kinking it can cause damage. For headphones the UPOCC litz wire is definitely better, but bulkier. It's not that heavy and harder to damage vs solid core and the cotton jacket is nice. I've made several HP cables for folks out of the litz wire and people were more than happy with it, no complaints about it being too inconvenient vs a smaller more compact cable. Also, for that length you might want to step the gauge up anyways... using 24g wire would get you 21g cable in a 4-strand braid but the litz would result in a 17g cable.

[Tyson]

Thanks for replying!  I thought about litz, but I thought that the point of OCC wire is to remove the grain in the copper wire.  Isn't going stranded just re-introducing that grain and thus negating the advantage of the OCC process?

[DaveC113]

Thanks for replying!  I thought about litz, but I thought that the point of OCC wire is to remove the grain in the copper wire.  Isn't going stranded just re-introducing that grain and thus negating the advantage of the OCC process?

Normal stranded wire does introduce some grain but litz wire's strands are individually insulated. It's definitely better than conventional solid-core UPOCC copper wire, but it takes a lot more effort to strip/tin the wire, you have to burn off the enamel insulation then scrape off the residue.