Speaker cables on AKSA

Occam · « **Reply #20 on:** 1 Feb 2005, 03:28 am »

Quote from: Gordy

One last oddity about the Tara's, the 18g wire is square, not round. This according to the included Tara propa... info sheet that came with the wires

Well dang Gordy, I didn't know that. My own Tara's which I've owned for 7 years have regular round wires. I circumcised my cables for internal speaker wiring within my Aksa. I did buy the Tara cables that are circulating with the touring amp and can't say I heard a difference between the 2. But I didn't do a critical comparison. If the current TFA II cables have the RSC, Rectangular Solid Core wire, it might well be a significant upgrade, if not sonically, at least with regards to bragging rights. If they are indeed presently supplied with RSC conductors, they're probably also OF8N(tm).
http://www.taralabs.com/Technology.asp
FWIW

Sam,
On my Taras (8 odd years old) the 3rd wire comprising the 'Return" feature is twisted along with the 2 other wires of the -/return cable. That specific 'Return' wire is connected at the speaker end, but cut and taped about 2" pror to the amplifier end and left floating. I've not a clue as to the technical justification for this, but I really like this cable. Go figure....

pauly · « **Reply #21 on:** 1 Feb 2005, 07:20 am »

I received my Tara Phase II cables today.
$99U.S. 10' terminated with heavy gold spades.
1 week delivery to Victoria Canada from The Cable Co.

The pos. leads have directional arrows , the neg. leads do not and the TFA return appears to be terminated at both ends.
They appear to have 14 strands of rectangular solid core per lead.
Here are some pix.

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?action=gallery;area=browse;album=486

Will hook em up soon.
Paul

lonewolfny42 · « **Reply #22 on:** 1 Feb 2005, 08:04 am »

Ten feet of Tara Cable (white cable) on my AKSA 100N+ at Saturday's NY Audio Rave meeting......a little long, but thats what I brought with me.

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Felipe · « **Reply #23 on:** 1 Feb 2005, 10:16 am »

Well it seems to me that these cables are , after all, very dificult to copy, taking in consideration the sourcing for rectangular solid copper wire !!
PLUS : no one talked about shielding....does this cable have shielding?

Still....one could give it a try with a decent quality round copper wire, but if my math doesnt fail me....i think its worthless.

First...for a 10' pair we need 5 times that much for each left/right speaker.
That is 10*5*2 = 100 feet of cable !!!!!!

Not counting on the waste when connecting the spades, and twisting the wires. But lets stick with the 100feet.
A proper round copper cable would be the Belden 82248 Coaxial cable. It has a very high purity copper and one could strip the shield off. But that is a $1USD/feet = $100 USD just for the wire !! NOT WORTH IT !!

Taking a cheap copper cable like antenna type wich costs about $20cent/feet = 20$USD . Add $15 for gold spades.
Now we need about 40 feet of shrink tube....IF there is no copper shield around them!! Add $15 of shrink tube.
Total $50 USD wich means too much for an experiment !!!!!!!!!!!!

I think this Tara Labs cable must be a giant killer...........

AKSA · « **Reply #24 on:** 1 Feb 2005, 11:01 am »

Ahem, Chris,

That was a great photo! Do tell - what was the NY Rave get together like? How did the AKSA perform? Any opinions from those present?

Cheers,

Hugh

Occam · « **Reply #25 on:** 1 Feb 2005, 12:54 pm »

Philipe,

Indeed, you are correct in that a 10' stereo pair would require 100' of solid core wire. But to test this design out, as a proof of concept, all it would require is 100' of 18ga enameled wire, I don't understand your reference to coaxial wire.... These Tara cable are not shielded in any way, and as a test, you could just twist those 2 or 3 strands of enameled solid core wire together and terminate. But given the 'low' price, and if shipping is not too problematic, I agree that it is simpler to just buy the damn stuff from Tara.

Pauly,
Thanks for the pictures. While I'm somewhat amazed that Tara is now using their 'upscale' rectangular solid core wire, RSC, I don't think they've changed their geometry. Looking at your pictures, the cable still appears to be made of those twisted 2 or 3 individual wires. I believe that paper insert describes the individual wires, but not the overall geometry of the TFA Phase II. If the RSC wires do deliver what they claim, or even if they're just as good as that in my 7yr old cable, they remain, IMO, a tremendous bargain..

Hugh,
I was at the Rave. My first. As expected, the N+ sounded wonderful driving the daCapo 3a speakers (speakers that can 'only' be driven by tube amps). Nothing about it grabbed you by the throat (save for the bass when called for), and it did what its supposed to do, clearly show the differences between other components, and otherwise, get out of the way.

Gordy · « **Reply #26 on:** 5 Feb 2005, 04:07 am »

I just stumbled across these cables while looking for attenuators: http://mysite.verizon.net/vze4c5pt/id6.html 14g solid rectangular core with teflon... inexpensive too!

Rhythm Willie · « **Reply #27 on:** 8 Feb 2005, 04:26 am »

Hugh,

Would be great if you could track down some bulk wire similar to the Tara's(China,taiwan,Australia maybe?), or other suitable supply for us DIYers. Some of the prices for exotic cables are criminal.

http://www.aurev.com/new/0904/13.tara.html

Rhythm Willie · « **Reply #28 on:** 8 Feb 2005, 04:35 am »

Sorry that link does'nt seem to work.

It was an article regards a long term investigation/prosecution into tara's cables being "Made in USA" when in fact they were sourced from China.

Seano · « **Reply #29 on:** 8 Feb 2005, 04:55 am »

Rhythmn
Welborne Labs in the States supplys solid 18ga teflon coated copper wire for US$0.80/foot. Admittedly it's round not square but that's minor.

According to the Tara recipe you'll need 100 foot for a pair of ten foot speaker cables. That's 80 bucks US plus shipping. Say all up AU$130.

For Hugh to bother with that he'd have to charge you the best bit of $200 for the same thing..........

Welborne ship to Oz, no worries. And have no minimum purchase.

www.welbornelabs.com

Rhythm Willie · « **Reply #30 on:** 8 Feb 2005, 05:50 am »

Seano,

Thanks for the info.

Is that the "solid core" Welbourne Labs 18gauge wire? I would'nt think the silver plated stranded would be desirable.

Is there any link to the Tara Labs Recipe?

Seano · « **Reply #31 on:** 9 Feb 2005, 09:51 pm »

Yes.

See Occam's description earlier in this post. Bear in mind that you could also use 18ga solid copper winding wire which is available from Jaycar for $8 for a 10m roll. $24 for enough to do a ten foot pair. Even cheaper experiement with probably very similar outcome.

PTFE or FEP (Teflon) tube to encapsulate the wires is available from Extech (www.extech.com.au) in Melbourne.....amongst others. As a price guide, a 25ft roll of FEP tube with a internal diameter of 6.4mm and wall thickness of 0.8 (Cole Parmer Cat No. CZ-06406-72) is US$33 while the PTFE tube of similar dimensions (Cole Parmer Cat. No. CZ-06605-03 is US$24.75 for a 12ft roll. The FEP is a good choice.

Of course you could wrap it all in plumbers tape..........

Perhaps over winter I might have a play myself.

Johnny · « **Reply #32 on:** 11 Feb 2005, 03:34 pm »

I've be thinking about new cables for my 55w. I'm currently biwired with Silver Sonic T-14. What is the collective wisdom on bi-wiring the AKSA in general and the Tara cable in prticular. I sure would like to cut the cable cost in half! Even primo DIY is not cheap...
Cheers!
John

Johnny · « **Reply #33 on:** 11 Feb 2005, 03:40 pm »

Quote from: Gordy

I just stumbled across these cables while looking for attenuators: http://mysite.verizon.net/vze4c5pt/id6.html 14g solid rectangular core with teflon... inexpensive too!

Anyone tried these cables?
The interconnects are unshielded

Occam · « **Reply #34 on:** 11 Feb 2005, 04:47 pm »

John - I don't recall hearing comments on the Taras on the 55s, so I can't comment specifically. Generally, when you bi-wire, you also double the capacitance, as they're parallel. This is what you are doing with your bi-wired runs of Silver Sonic T-14s. I'd suggest the following experiment -

You've presently got your 4 cables of T-14 (twisted pair), with each cable having one of the wires for (+) and the other (-) wired to those same polarities on the speaker for their respective channel and frequency range.
[confusing description, but just look at your present connections and it will make sense]

Rewire so that now each cable feeds its channels specific polaritiy, i.e. Take a T-14 run and connect it so that at the amplifier end you connect both leads to the right channels (+) terminal, and at the biwired speaker end connect one lead to the woofer's (+) and the other to the tweeter's (+). Be consistent with colors, like black to bass and red to treble, and rewire the other three cables to give you a biwire run that emulates the Tara's physical separation of polarities.

PSP · « **Reply #35 on:** 14 Feb 2005, 11:57 pm »

OK, I got my Tara Labs TFA Phase II with return cables... as noted above, the red cable has a directional arrow (which way should it go?) and the black cable is labeled "space and time with return" but has no arrow. The black cable is not noticably thicker at one end (measured it with calipers) either. There were no instructions included... what have you guys been doing?

Many thanks,
Peter

PT914 · « **Reply #36 on:** 15 Feb 2005, 01:20 am »

Got mine a few days ago and it was configured for biwiring which I didn't need. The ends to the speakers were not terminated and the arrows for the positive side points to the speaker terminal. On the negative side, the word "space" is to the amplifier and "return" end to speaker. The space end is connected to the two center wires that have a clear insulation. The surrounding blue insulated wire is not connected at the space end or amplifier end. The ends are crimped and soldered.

Philip

Johnny · « **Reply #37 on:** 16 Feb 2005, 03:06 pm »

Occam, thanks for the tip. I didn't have a clear picture of the Tara geometry- that its sort of a biwire variant.

I tried your suggestion with my T-14 wires over the weekend. First impressions are warmer more fluid sonics over all, and the elimination of some harshness and loss of soundstage at higher volumes that was a source of iritation in the previous configuration.
Thanks!

Quote from: Occam

John - I don't recall hearing comments on the Taras on the 55s, so I can't comment specifically. Generally, when you bi-wire, you also double the capacitance, as they're parallel. This is what you are doing with your bi-wired runs of Silver Sonic T-14s. I'd suggest the following experiment -

You've presently got your 4 cables of T-14 (twisted pair), with each cable having one of the wires for (+) and the other (-) wired to those same polarities on the speaker for their respective channel and frequency range.
[confusing description, but just look at your present connections and it will make sense]

Rewire so that now each cable feeds its channels specific polaritiy, i.e. Take a T-14 run and connect it so that at the amplifier end you connect both leads to the right channels (+) terminal, and at the biwired speaker end connect one lead to the woofer's (+) and the other to the tweeter's (+). Be consistent with colors, like black to bass and red to treble, and rewire the other three cables to give you a biwire run that emulates the Tara's physical separation of polarities....

Occam · « **Reply #38 on:** 16 Feb 2005, 07:33 pm »

Johhny - You're quite welcome. I hope your continued listening will comfirm that evaluation. Its always nice when your experiment (which you dump, unverified, into someone else's lap) works out. Hopefully, some others, with similar biwiring arrangements will also experiment and post their reactions.

There is a potential downside to this configuration. Typically, the way one uses a twisted pair (or starquad) cable like the T-14, provides some measure of noise rejection (external RFI/EMI 'imposes' itself equally on both wires and the common mode configuration 'rejects' it)). You forgoe this potential benefit when you reconfigure the wiring as I suggested. If one's cables are sheilded, its moot. Personally, I live in noisey NYC and all my speakercables (Taras and Black Orphesus triwire harness consisting of 12 separate cables) are unsheilded and not intrinsically noise rejecting. I've not experienced any noise pickup problems with them.
YMMV

kyrill · « **Reply #39 on:** 17 Feb 2005, 09:07 pm »

Once I met a boy and in the many conversations we had he mentioned that he was particular happy with the clean water he and his parents enjoyed when they used the water coming out of the tap.
Before that they lived at the outside of the city which did not had fresh tapwater.

I tasted that water, it was .. eh drinkable. It looked pure, it had no smell, it tasted eh.. metallic, in a sense insipid, it definitely had a taste of its own.

The boy could not know. Our brain projects an experience to the event when expectations meet conditions. Under a certain treshold of "pureness" water will tasts clean or even pure.

I have at home a reversed osmosis water purifier that cleans the already clean tap water another 90 %. As soon as you get accustomed to it, the difference is not subte at all. 10 out of 10 times you could discern blindfolded what you were drinking. The 4 cats of the neighbour don't drink their owners water anymore as soon as they discovered the water of my dog.. So he was forced to get our water on a daily basis and then their whole family fell for it too.