[Bilavideo]

 

Ok just one last dumb question, and I think I will make an order with homegrown audio.  How necessary is the sleeving on the bottom part of the cable?  Is it just for protection?  My thinking is I don't really want the added bulk...I don't think I'll make the cable removable, I think I'll just solder it in and and use the heat shrink tubes as strain relief.
 
I've been listening to the modded SR-60s using some of the songs I use as my standard to test headphones, Social Distortion's "Down On the World Again," "When the Angels Sing," and AFI's, "Carcinogen Crush," and I am hearing little details in the treble, I have not heard on my recabled Triple Fi 10.  This is completely insane for me as I know these songs very well, and I find the Triple Fi 10's to be very revealing in the treble!  I'm not the most experienced guy around, but I've owned/listened to my fair share of phones, and this blows me away.
 
I can't wait to finish my project SR-60 with a recable, and be even further in audio nirvana!

Cable makers doll their wire up, and it's typical to bulk up the cable to give the impression that the buyer is getting serious conductivity.  In truth, all it takes is wire and some basic insulation.  You could even run bare wire and give it multiple coats of polyurethane.  There are all kinds of strategies employed to improve conductivity, including running multiple tiny wires twisted in rotation to provide more wire while minimizing the "skin effect," but so much of this is hoo hah.  Impedance is the big issue.  Cheap, tiny, flimsy wire will raise your impedance and effect the sound negatively, but once you increase the wire content, you could run lamp cord for all it matters.
 
I took $10 worth of speaker cable (18 awg) and hooked it up to a pair of Grados and the bass was better.  I then hooked up 16 awg but didn't notice an improvement.  Running a pair of 24awg wires would have the same effect as a single 18 awg wire (That's where Grado gets its eight-conductor cable: 2 wires for each of four lines).  
 
Long story short, you don't need thick, heavy cabling to get the job done.  There's a critical mass but once you hit it, you're good.  A lot of the sleeving wars are about marketability.  Oh, one more thing.  Gold is non-corrosive, which is why it's plated onto connectors all the time.  But the conductivity of gold is significantly less than that of copper.  So there's no "sound" reason to spend money on gold-plated connectors.

 

[Limberger]

Okay, so I opened up my sr60i's last night and punched 8 holes. When I went to put them back together though, I forgot which one was left and which one was right. Am i right in thinking that the blue and white are left and the red and blue are the right?

 

[sml1226]

Okay, so I opened up my sr60i's last night and punched 8 holes. When I went to put them back together though, I forgot which one was left and which one was right. Am i right in thinking that the blue and white are left and the red and blue are the right?

My 125i has red on left, blue on right.

 

[Bilavideo]

 

Quote:

Okay, so I opened up my sr60i's last night and punched 8 holes. When I went to put them back together though, I forgot which one was left and which one was right. Am i right in thinking that the blue and white are left and the red and blue are the right?

My 125i has red on left, blue on right.

I, too, have blue on the right.  I also have it on the left.  It's the ground wire in both cups (at least in the SR60s I'm wearing at the moment).  The left terminal is the ground.  It's the common color.  Make sure it's on the left in each cup.  You don't want to get your common wire mixed with your channel wires.  In one configuration, you end up with drivers out of phase (kiss your bass goodbye); in the other, you end up in mono (great bass, kiss your treble goodbye).  My left cup has a red wire on the right; my right cup has a white wire on the right.
 

Okay, so I opened up my sr60i's last night and punched 8 holes. When I went to put them back together though, I forgot which one was left and which one was right. Am i right in thinking that the blue and white are left and the red and blue are the right?

As long as you have your grounds lined up, this question of channel orientation is easily fixable.  I use The Who's "Pinball Wizard" to doublecheck my left and right.  It's one of those old sixties recordings where the left and right channels are radically different because the typical "hi-fi" was a record player whose speakers were in the lid and positioned right next to each other.  Who would have thought an early stereo gimmick would have been so useful fifty years later?
 
The ground wires are the common color.  As long as they're aligned properly, you can switch the cups (without rewiring) by simply pulling the rod out of its slot (pop the stopper at the top) and switch.  It's a 30-second fix.  Even quicker is to simply flip the headphone around but getting the left in the left and the right in the right is surprisingly therapeutic for sound.  Your imaging will go from night to day.

 

[eclein]

Play a CD in your player and unplug the right channel...follow the sound...

 

[Bilavideo]

 

Play a CD in your player and unplug the right channel...follow the sound...

You've nailed it, Ed.  That's the BilaGrado mantra right there: Follow the sound.  Please tell me somebody hasn't snagged it.  It's terrific!

 

[Limberger]

Fixed. Thank you very much!
My roommate looked at me like I was crazy last night when I was putting the headphones in steamy water. He also wanted me to go Poseidon adventure just for the lulz. Needless to say I didnt let him get near what I was doing.

 

[Majestic]

Quote:

Fixed. Thank you very much!
My roommate looked at me like I was crazy last night when I was putting the headphones in steamy water. He also wanted me to go Poseidon adventure just for the lulz. Needless to say I didnt let him get near what I was doing.

Glad to hear. Asked this question earlier but didn't see a response so I used the audio card on my PC and did a sound test. This moves that channel from left to right. 
How is the sound in your opinion now that you punched some holes? And how many holes did you punch BTW.
 

 

[Danthrax]

I just used a hair dryer, because you know less condensation on electrical equipment

 

[Limberger]

 
Quote:

Quote:

Fixed. Thank you very much!
My roommate looked at me like I was crazy last night when I was putting the headphones in steamy water. He also wanted me to go Poseidon adventure just for the lulz. Needless to say I didnt let him get near what I was doing.

Glad to hear. Asked this question earlier but didn't see a response so I used the audio card on my PC and did a sound test. This moves that channel from left to right. 
How is the sound in your opinion now that you punched some holes? And how many holes did you punch BTW.
 

I punched 8 holes. There is definitely more bass, but its not uncontrolled. The bass also has some more punch. I'm loving me some Zappa right now

 

[eclein]

 
First ones(SR60) I punched 4 holes, they are getting Cocobolo shells so they may get some more.
 
Second pair (SR125) I punched 7 holes and did the foam grill..they have nice tight bass.

 

[eclein]

 

[BobSaysHi]

Quote:

I'm still not quite sure what this "padding" that you keep talking about looks like. Could you take a picture of just the padding, or is it already glued in?

 

[Majestic]

I played with some pleather pads from another pair of phones and the bass responded positively but the highs went away. I would like to find  that  "Balance" in the sound so 'm going to try something different. I don't think the highs were effected by the Pads themselves as maybe the distance of the driver from the ear. I'll put them back on and try with an amp to see if that's helps. If it does that simply means a little more juice may be needed to " push " the sound out. I do think the open cell Grado pads have a direct effect on the sound but I do notice that after a good listening session, the pads have an imprint of my ear formed into it. Almost like memory foam. The larger pads fit around my ear.
 
I'm searching for better pads since I really like the comfort of the ear pads on my Sennheisers. They fit around the ear and one pair is made from a velour type of material. Down side is your ear does not breath as much so they get hot. 
 
I don't mind the Grado ear pads but I have to bend the headband outward to loosen them up a bit and then tend to slid off your noggin. Tighten by bending inward and they vice your head. 
 
I'll find a solution at some point and continue to drool at the sound that these phones are putting out. 
 

 

[eclein]

Quote:

I'm still not quite sure what this "padding" that you keep talking about looks like. Could you take a picture of just the padding, or is it already glued in?

Bob- When I took the shells apart on the 125's, I was able to loosen the glue and take the plastic screen with the attached SR125 logo button out of its cap. So I had a shell with the driver tray/cup thing and the top cap by itself-nothing attached, no screen or logo.
Look at this picture and visualize the plastic screen and the SR125 logo button behind the thin cheesy foam I cut to fit the cap in the pciture below


So directly behind this thin foam in the middle of the shell is the screen and logo button, and the screen and logo button are holding in the foam from the pressure of the other cup that holds the driver.
So if you had x-ray vision and looked at this picture above you would see the plastic screen and the SR125 logo button behind that foam-thats why the foam kinda sticks out a bit because of the button behind it. I put the cup with the driver back in the shell and it is now holding the plastic screen and logo button up against the foam thus making it look pretty cool I think actually. Follow me??