[jms007bnd007]

What tools do you need besides a soldering iron and an ohm meter to begin making DIY cables? Also, about how long does it take to make a simple RCA to RCA IC?

 

[Sol_Zhen]

Quote:

Originally posted by jms007bnd007 What tools do you need besides a soldering iron and an ohm meter to begin making DIY cables? Also, about how long does it take to make a simple RCA to RCA IC?

A wire stripper, clippers and you might want some heatshrink to use as stress relief.

You can knock a pair out in less than 30 minutes while not trying to work fast.

 

[MagusG]

what is the best kind of solder to use? I am going to make a 6ft mini-mini with the mini star quad(black) and some black switchcraft RA mini's(gold plated). hope it turns out right. and i hope i can tell a difference between this new cable and my ratshack one. Also will it do anything if i add some ferrite clips to the cable?

 

[mclaren20]

Quote:

Originally posted by antness use an ohm-meter to check for continuity edit: if you don't have an ohm-meter, there's a bunch of tricks you can do to figure out which wires are the same.

what are some of these tricks?




sorry to bump...

 

[stereth]

I'd guess he was talking about a DIY continuity checker. Hook up a 9V battery to a resistor and a LED. Break the circuit somewhere and use the two ends for your probes. If you touch them to something that completes the circuit, the LED will light.

Or you could grab a 9V battery and touch it to both parts, and watch for sparks. That seems more like the "blowing up batteries" part...

 

[caableguy]

OK now I am interested, is there any one place to go and see how to make these interconnect cables. I am interested in a 1/8th in. mini for my portable to my headphone amp. I just recieved my airhead amp and I'm not totaly impressed with it. So now I am looking into maybe building one of those too!! sounds like a cmoy is a good first time one.

SO any help would be greatly accepted!!

 

[Sol_Zhen]

Quote:

Originally posted by caableguy OK now I am interested, is there any one place to go and see how to make these interconnect cables. I am interested in a 1/8th in. mini for my portable to my headphone amp. I just recieved my airhead amp and I'm not totaly impressed with it. So now I am looking into maybe building one of those too!! sounds like a cmoy is a good first time one. SO any help would be greatly accepted!!

Just buy the parts, grab a soldering iron and enjoy!

 

[was ist los?]

You must mean soldering iron

 

[damitamit]

made a trip down to Camdem today, to VDC Trading (for all u UK headfiers). VDC

Perveyors of all things Van Damme (cable manufacturer), i picked up some Van Damme star quad microphone cable and some 3.5mm large diameter connectors.

The cable is made up of the same config as the Canare star quad and also looks exactly like it. Also the connectors are exactly like the ones u've used Sol_Zhen, thou marked VDC instead.

So tonite i shall be a cable copycat and make up a mini to mini out the BLUE star quad (yes, ive even got the right cable copy colours

) and vdc 3.5mm connectors.

will post pics in a couple hours...

btw, what did u decided with the usage of the 4 wires? contrary to the star quad config warning im thinking of using 1 blue for left, 1 blue for right and the 2 white for ground...

 

[dokebi]

Sorry for thread hijacking. Would it be worthwhile providing I don't care about cable thickness to make a 6 conducter (2G,2LC,2RC) wire or would it be not worth it?

 

[ablaze]

question for the experts:
why use the 4 conductors in the quad cable as 1 left 1 right, 2 ground? whats the logic behind this instead of say 2 left, 2 right, shield ground?

also, has anyone compared the other quad cables eg. Mogami 2534, Klotz star-quad, to the Canare star-quad?

 

[winston61]

I use the same cables with Neutrik connectors and I use the braided shield for ground. Never a problem. You'll like the Canare cable.

 

[tangent]

You can indeed rely on the shield as ground. Indeed, that's why the cable is made that way: the shield is there to protect the signal wires within from interference by draining RFI to ground. Disconnecting the shield at one end is a different issue.

Markertek will make cables for you from these parts, and they use the shield braid as ground. For unbalanced cables, they use one twisted pair for one channel, and the other pair for the other channel. For balanced connectors, one pair is + and the other pair is -; as I recalll, the ground pin and shell are then connected together with the shield braid, but I don't have a Markertek XLR handy to check that at the moment.

 

[ablaze]

thanks guys.
so which method's better?

 

[damitamit]

the copies are done..

was gonna heatshrink under the strain relief springs, but it wouldnt fit. so used magic tape instead!

definately sound better than my Xin mini-to-mini. very pleased!

thanks for the inspiration sol_zhen