[mca]

I am getting ready to purchase a B.P.T BP-2.5 Ultra (with Bybees   ) and plan to plug my entire system into it. Only problem is, the power cords on my Mits Diamond TV and Paradigm Servo 15 are too short by about 5 feet. I don't want to spend a ton of money, but also don't want to have to use an appliance grade type extension cord.

[_scotty_]

Go to Lowes or Home Depot and buy 10ga thhn stranded wire. If you need a 8ft. extension cord buy 2 8ft. pieces and twist tightly together.If you need a 3wire buy a piece of 14ga thhn stranded for the ground. You can also buy the ends you need to complete the extension cord there as well. Us the high quality Leviton or equivalent male and female ends. Each extension cord should cost less than $20.00.

[warnerwh]

Try this, it's not cheap though:
http://cgi.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cl.pl?accspowr&1070258334

this should be more accurate, it's at the bottom of the page.

[mca]

Say what??

[Tonto Yoder]

You could combine scotty's and warner's ideas--use scotty's DIY recipe but put a high-quality duplex receptacle (or 2?) in a workbox at the end.


http://signalcable.com/magicextension.html lists the specs of the extension: It's 10 ga wire just a scotty suggested, but with Marinco connectors rather than the HD/Lowe's plugs/recpetacles.. As warner mentioned, it's $135 so I doubt it's within the budget you're thinking of.

[pugs]

Which is better, Chris Venhaus Hot Box or Signal Cable Magic extension box?  They look similar, but the Magic extension is a lot cheaper.  Does anyone have experience with one or both?

Thanks

[Tonto Yoder]

Another "contender" is from Aural Thrills, another company that advertises on Audiogon--

http://www.auralthrillsaudio.com/power%20box.htm

The VenHaus "Hot Box" (certainly the box itself looks like something from Home Depot)--

[beat]

I built this pretty inexpensively. I used tinned 10awg with two sets of ground wires. There is not a lot of capacitance in this configuration.

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?action=gallery;area=browse;album=128

supposedly this style of braiding smooths out the flow somehow..

[satfrat]

Another "contender" is from Aural Thrills, another company that advertises on Audiogon--

http://www.auralthrillsaudio.com/power%20box.htm

The VenHaus "Hot Box" (certainly the box itself looks like something from Home Depot)--

                   Chris`s extension box gets my nod, no doubt. I`ve had both PC`s and VenHaus`s PC is hands down the better of the two, both on audio/video. As a suggestion, installing Bybee`s on the outlet`s would make for a kick-ass conditioner for a deeper bass response and a much blacker black presentation on the Mits. Bybee`s in the power gave my Sony XBR glossy blacks, much preferred. I have no doubts that Chris would install them for you also. Regards, Robin

[mca]

Since the cords will be plugged into the BPT, which will have Bybee's installed, I am hoping that will "perk" up the Mits.
For the price of the couple of extension boxes shown, I think I will try Tonto's suggestion and attempt my first DIY project and build my own  

[eico1]

Another "contender" is from Aural Thrills, another company that advertises on Audiogon--

http://www.auralthrillsaudio.com/power%20box.htm

The VenHaus "Hot Box" (certainly the box itself looks like something from Home Depot)--

ok, the other looks like something from home depot painted!!!

steve

[satfrat]

Whoops, I forgot bout that. Your DIY outlet is definitely the path to take. Ain`t that hard, have fun. Regards, Robin

[mca]

Wonder if "home made power cords" is covered on my home insurance, just in case I burn the place down  

[bubba966]

Since the cords will be plugged into the BPT, which will have Bybee's installed, I am hoping that will "perk" up the Mits.
For the price of the couple of extension boxes shown, I think I will try Tonto's suggestion and attempt my first DIY project and build my own  

Well, if you aren't really picky about the looks, it should be cheap & easy to build a box on your own similar to the ones in the pics above.

A 2 duplex steel box should only be a couple of bucks. 2 20A hospital grade isolated ground (model #IG8300RN) duplex's at Loewes are under $10 each. And a decent 20A plug (hospital grade if you can find it) at around $15-20. Then a few more bucks for wire and you're set. Hell, I could give you 6' of 10ga Romex (good for 30A) if you want. That'd take care of the wire...

So for $40-50 you've got an extension cord as good, or maybe even better than those pictured above.

Neither box above has 20A plugs. The VH box dooesn't even have hospital grade duplex's. They're either comercial or industrial grade, which don't grip like a hospital grade does.

And the other box only has red duplex's, which doesn't really mean they're hospital grade (though it's a good chance they are).

[Lak]

IMO: I like to purchase an aluminum cast outdoor single or double AC box available at your regular home supply store (colors: brown, gray, white).  Use the wire of your choice (good suggestions above), the AC male plug of your choice.  I highly recommend you use a cryo'd outlet because it will give you superior dynamics.  I have tested a dozen of the major brands and prefer the Porter port (my unbiased opinion is available in my review on Audiogon).  Purchase whatever product you like, I'm just suggesting what my years of research tells me works best in my system.
If you really want to go all out you could add an IEC to the outlet box, which will give you the option of changing power cords quickly.
I have put together the above (including cryo'd outlet) for under $50, and it sounds as good or usually better than the expensive stuff you can buy and it looks VERY good.  
Best regards,
Lak

[Tonto Yoder]

Looks like the Ven Haus box uses Pass & Seymour receptacles and they ARE cryogenically treated--

"VH Audio has designed a special outlet box named The Hot Box. Key features include:
* Star wiring to each receptacle. (The receptacles aren't "daisy-chained" together).
* A modified Flavor 4 cord connected to the outlet box. Two separate 10 AWG Teflon/Bare copper ground wires are spaced from each other as they spiral around the outside of the cable, counter to the twist of the internal conductors.
* The cryoe'd outlets are electrically isolated from the metal box. One of the ground wires is connected to the outlets' grounds (in a star wire fashion), and the other ground is connected to the box. Most manufacturers "float" the metal box or they ground the outlet to the box. Steel has excellent permeability of magnetic fields- so it is a good thing to have steel for box construction. By connecting a ground to the box, it also drains away RF, and makes for a much SAFER box.
* All internal wiring is SPACED AWAY from the box itself, in order to keep the interactions of the conductors with metal box to a minimum.
* Your choice of 15 or 20 amp deep cryogenically treated Pass & Seymour receptacles (5262AI or 5362AI)
* Also available with nickel-plated cryoe'd CR6200 (15A) or CR 6300 (20A) receptacles.
* The Hot Box contains NO field-generating LED's, poor switches, or IEC inlets. Just raw power delivered to your components without adding any grunge... "

[Lak]

I'm sure it's good, but how much does the Ven Haus box cost?
Lak

[Tonto Yoder]

I believe the cheapest VenHaus Hot Box was $189.  I didn't mean to suggest that MCA buy that particular model, but thought the recipe might offer some other DIY options for brands of receptacles, gauge of wire (seems like everyone's using 10 ga.)  etc.

[satfrat]

www.venhaus1.com does offer designs for the DIY guy along with the parts needed. If for no other reason, it would be a good site for design/parts needed to build your own. Chris is very good at offering advise to anyone in need. Nothing actually needs to be purchased thru him all tho everything he sells is audio grade quality,,,, outlets included Bubba. JMO as Chris has been very helpful to me and he`s a guy that I consider a friend. Regards, Robin

[John Casler]

I am getting ready to purchase a B.P.T BP-2.5 Ultra (with Bybees   ) and plan to plug my entire system into it. Only problem is, the power cords on my Mits Diamond TV and Paradigm Servo 15 are too short by about 5 feet. I don't want to spend a ton of money, but also don't want to have to use an appliance grade type extension cord.

Just a quick note on a listening session (shoot out) we had over the weekend - (I'll write more in a seperate 2 channel post when time allows)

It involved both KeithR and Mad Dog (both have great ears, on my RM40 system.

We were A/B'ing the BPT BP-1 with Bybee's, silver wiring and High Current Noise filter, in a custom configuration allowing digital and analog front end to be on the transformer and the amps to be on the bybees/HCNF but not on the transformer, with a Sound Aplications XE-12S ($4200 power conditioner)

Now I didn't expect the BP1 @ around $1000 to keep up with the $4200 XE-12S, but a strange thing happened.  The XE-12S seemed clearly superior in the tranparency of the highs.  Bummer!  

So we continued testing Shunyata Power cables to BPT cables etc and we moved on.

Later after everyone had left, I began experimenting.  Mad Dog, Keith and I all thought that the "transparency" disparity might have been because of the Bybees.

I had my doubts, since it is hard for me to beleive that the "sound" (other than cleaning up power artifacts and allowing for the clean flow of power in dynamics) could actually be affected "before" the electrons are turned into actual sonic signals, but I wanted to experiment.

So I unplugged my amp (600wpc CineNova) from the BP-1 (even via a cheap power strip extension cord) straight into the wall outlet.

BANG!! the same transparency that the XE-12S seemed to exhibit.

Boy was I surprised  

So this is not an indictment of bybees, but more a "make sure and try this" suggestion.  And of course much will be dependant on your system.

Needless to say I have ordered a longer BPT -L9 power Cord for my amp to run it straight into the wall and circumvent the bybees.

Also It should be emphasized that the front end (preamp, DVD/CD player, sat, projection TV, etc) are plugged into the bybee'd isolated BP-1 transformer with a beautiful result.

Anyhow, make sure and do an A/B of "with and without", to see if it affects your system.