DIY Cable Gallery!! - Page 51

someone likes the braiding!

speaking of braids,
my first attempt at a 6 wire braid.

I have not had much time to work on cables here lately, but I had a chance to sit down tonight and make this......





Pure silver solid core wire w/ Teflon insulation (from group buy) in a 4 strand Litz braid
Neutrik 3.5mm plugs
White Techflex
Kester silver solder

This cable was really small but sounds great. This was my first pure silver cable and I must say not bad at all. Here's a pic of the braid...

Thanks to your help, RnB180 I finished braiding my headphone splitter cable the other day. This is a 6 (22AWG s.p.c.)strand Litz braid that goes into 2 tri-braids. I still have to put connectors on it, but I will post pic when done.



I really like this color combo. I ordered the orange,red, and yellow wire with the intention of creating a "flame" look. It turned out better than I hoped. I call it my "Dragon's Flame". I am in a delima on how to cover the wire, if I even put any Techflex on at all. I like the look of the naked wire. Carbon Techflex gives it a smokey look, which I like.

I regret techflexing my cables. I don't like the texture. I don't think it would look as good with the carbon techflex.

Headchange4u, is that teflon insulation chrome-like or is that just the lighting?

Good stuff, I thinkn your 6 conductor braid is different from mine, as yours looks like a litz style and mine looks like a chain link type braid.

its silver with a clear coating of teflon.

with some beautiful shot under some great lighting.

Headchange,

I would skipped the white flex and sleeved that braid into a clear tube so that it can be seen, IMO the flexing hides its stunning looks. when you have something like that show it off!

I noticed the difference in our braids. Mine is basically a Litz braid technique that I modified for 6 strands. I did quite a bit of searching trying to find different ways of braiding 6 strands, but most were to confusing.

In all honesty I like your braid better because of the shape and the way the wires are braided looks better. I wish you could explain how it was done, but I know explaining braiding techniques is a little difficult.

I would have left the Techflex off, but this was silver wire from the group buy and it already had Teflon insulation on the wire. The Litz braid ended up being REALLY small so I decided to cover it. The solid core wire also retains bends more than stranded cable which also was another reason for the Techflex. It just made the cable look a lot cleaner and nicer. I also left the heat shrink off the connectors because a friend of mine always complains about me covering up the connectors. The cable ended up being very "danity" as my wife calls it.


Just the lighting I used. Teflon insulation is kinda shiny anyways.

I spent some more time comparing this pure silver mini with a Star Quad mini last night. The difference in the sound of the two cables was pretty apprent. The silver cable was a lot brighter and lacked fullness and punch in the bass compared to the Star Quad. After a couple of hours of listening I decicded that I really don't care to much for the sound of the silver. I am thinking about doing a 6 strand braid with one copper conductor and one silver conductor for each channel. I think that this may offer the best of both worlds; the brightness and detail of silver with the warmth of copper. It may also sound like crap, but you never know until you try.

I have also decided to go with naked wire on the splitter cable above. I will dress the Y-section up with some heat shrink, but that will be about it. I will post pics when done.

Nice work on the HD201s... I might just have to try the same thing when mine get here. Its not like its a big investment gone if you mess it up.

Finished my 6-strand to 2 3-strand braids headphone splitter cable. Decided to leave it naked and I left the heatshrink off the connectoes again.

22AWG silver plated copper in a Litz braid X 6
Canare F-12 mini
Calrad mimi jack X 2
Silver bearing solder






I have good news and bad news. The good news is that the cable came out looking great. The bad news is that it doesn't work very well. If coming straight out of the iPod you can barely here any sound at all, even with the volume turned all the way up. I also tried through my Pimeta. I got plenty of sound but it was horribly distorted. I was using the stock iPod buds and the stock buds that came with my Delphi MyFi unit. I think they are the same impedence.

I'm kinda bummed they didn't work cause I really like the cable. Maybe I am doing something wrong. Here's the pics either way....

headchange4u,
is the sound distorted with only 1 headphone attached? if so you probably have a small short signal to ground on one of the connectors. Check for drips of solder and loose wire strands.

Its the added resistance. which is why its distorted.
run it out of a headphone amplifier and see how it works.

you know, I used to think Kimber Kables looked spectacular and unique, after visting the DIY forums. When I see a kimber cable it looks like a home made DIY now

I took apart the connectors. I knew I didn't have a drip of solder or loose wire because I wrap each individual solder connector in Teflon tape.

My problem is those cheaply made Calrad connectors. The ground clamp has dislodged from the main body of the plug. I can plug my headphones and push the ground clamp in and they work fine. I can see the ground clamp slide out of the body of the plug when I let go of the wire. It just comes out a little bit but its enough to be causing problems in my ground channel. I'm going to try a little solder and see if that helps.

I really wish Canare would start making a 3.5mm cable end jack in their F-line of connectors, like the F-12. Maybe we should start a petition to get Canare to start manufacturing these.

It's when its running out of my amp that I get the distorted sound. I get almost no sound straight from a source.


EDIT:
Thanks for the tip, bg4533!

It was the ground clamp on the Calrad connectors. I soldered the connectors where the ground clamp goes into the body of the plug and got nothing but crystal clean sound out of both my iPod and Pimeta. Problem fixed so now my cable looks good AND works properly.

I have used the Calrad connectors before with no problems, but I have always thought the ground clamp was a little lacking.