Making your own RCA

[MrLister]

One thing I always hate is the extra slack in the RCA cables. Anybody here make their own? Any downsides to it? Lastly, which bulk cable / tip do you recommend?

Thanks!

[undone1]

X2 on this subject....

[Toys7505]

Check out the tutorial section of this forum.....has a thread all by itself on how to make your own RCA cables.

[kyheng]

Basicly this sunject has been talked over and over again... But for good sounded RCA, can try silver plated coaxial. You may surprise with the sound....

[MrLister]

I've seen the other subjects but what I missed from the other discussions is:

1) what are the downsides?
2) what's the difference between $2 RCA connectors and $20 RCA connectors?

[Toys7505]

basically the difference is the name on the connector.......

[kyheng]

As long as still copper heads, it should have minimum difference(I'm noob on hearing such difference)

[91dime]

I have been looking into this. I have alot of cat5 cable, and I have been told it is good, but its not shielded. I think I am going to use microphone cable, you can do a two channel rca from one microphone cable. I am not sure on which jumpers to go with, but like kyheng said as long as thy are copper it shouldnt matter.

[Mless5]

Originally Posted by MrLister

2) what's the difference between $2 RCA connectors and $20 RCA connectors?

Price (sorry, couldn't resist)

My setup always changes, so I buy longer cables and loop them under back seat.

[m115919h]

I found this article on interconnect cables Jon_Risch's Web Site it is a pretty interesting read. Based on this article I have determined that Belden 87760 is probably the best cable to use. There are plenty of other Belden cables that would work as well, but this is the cable I plan on buying at some point.

[Z3Sooner]

Originally Posted by MrLister

I've seen the other subjects but what I missed from the other discussions is:

1) what are the downsides?
2) what's the difference between $2 RCA connectors and $20 RCA connectors?

1.) None really. You get a high quality cable at a much better price.
2.) $18.00

I just made my first practice cable with Canare Star Quad and Neutrik NYS373 connectors.



I used star quad so that I could do two channels per cable and I grounded the shield to one connector at one end. Of course, this makes the cable directional so I marked the source end with some white shrink under the connector spring



I'm going to use this one on my home stereo. I have solid black tech flex for the sub channels, black w/blue tracer for the mids and the white tracer for the tweets.

[MrLister]

Looks good, I placed my order tonight so I'll have a shot at it next week.

[Bom]

I used Belden 89259 as per Jon Risch's recommend. Very good clean sounding cable at cheap price. I used Cardas Rhodium rca connectors and Cardas solder.

[91dime]

Could I get some links to where you bought your cable and jacks?

[Z3Sooner]

Originally Posted by 91dime

Could I get some links to where you bought your cable and jacks?

If you're asking me I bought my cable and jacks here:

Full Compass - Pro Audio, Video, A/V & Lighting Equipment - Largest Microphone Dealer in the Nation

I bought the tech flex from:

http://stores.shop.ebay.com/FURRYLETTERS__W0QQ_armrsZ1

Here's a good place to get the Belden 89259, but I don't personally believe the whole "foamed teflon" theory. As you can see, it's about $3.50/ft. for one channel. To each his own, however. If you want a good, low capacitance double braid shield cable at a more reasonable price rawcable also carries Belden 1505F for around $0.60/ft.

http://www.rawcable.com/cable/index.htm

[mda185]

Another option to consider is MIL Spec twisted shielded pair cable that can be found on the surplus market and frequently on Ebay. It is teflon insulated with a full copper braid. The braid and the conductors are frequently silver or tin plated. The spec is a general one that allows for different wire gauge and construction. The twisted pair conductors are available from 12-22 gauge. The most common sizes I have seen on the surplus market are 20-22 gauge conductors. This is fine for low level RCA signals.

I am a EE and I have used this cable in aircraft and gas turbine engine test cells for many years. It has excellent noise rejection properties and is also suitable for high temperature environments. Not important for car audio but extremely useful for DIY engine sensor and fuel injection cables. (My other passion is engine tuning.)

I just saw an auction on Ebay where about 300' sold for less than $20. I think it is typical to find this cable for 10-30 cents per foot. Cost varies with the quantity if you buy from a surplus dealer. I just picked up an 1100 foot reel of 22 guage for $110.00 on Ebay. MIL surplus dealers typically charge more than this. I plan on making a variety of cables with it starting with some high quality DIY Symbilink cables. This stuff is perfect for that application.

The teflon insulation is a little more difficult to strip but it is workable if you just take your time. I find traditional wire strippers don't work well. I use an exacto knife and slit the teflon while not cutting through the copper braid shield.

Our tax dollars paid for this stuff for military applications. I personally get a kick out of being able to purchase this stuff for less than a tenth of its original cost to support my addictions. I also believe it is superior to just about all of the other audio cables on the consumer market regardless of price but that is my opinion. I am not interested in arguing the finer points of cable construction. I just wanted to present an option that is in the true spirit of DIY on a budget. If you are interested, try doing searches for MIL Spec Teflon cable. You can also add the words twisted pair to the search but in general, most examples of MIL Spec with Teflon insulation are going to be two conductor twisted pair.

[Z3Sooner]

In the case of unbalanced RCA cables, the twisted pair doesn't give you any advantages, but it doesn't hurt anything either. It sounds like it would be a very good option for a single channel RCA cable. The braided shielding is good for car applications. It sounds like a good price as well. Are the conductors individually shielded or are they both inside the same shield? The reason I'm asking is if they are individually shielded you coudl use it for two channels.



The star quad cable is typcially about $0.50/ft, but it's 4 conductor so you can get two channels per cable. I will say that the star quad is a little tough to work with as well. The toughest part was unravelling the shield to get a long enough portion to ground the shield.

[Z3Sooner]

Originally Posted by 91dime

I have been looking into this. I have alot of cat5 cable, and I have been told it is good, but its not shielded. I think I am going to use microphone cable, you can do a two channel rca from one microphone cable. I am not sure on which jumpers to go with, but like kyheng said as long as thy are copper it shouldnt matter.

You are correct, Cat5 is a bad choice for RCA cables.

[mda185]

Z3Sooner, the MIL spec twisted pairs are not individually shielded. There is only the copper braid surrounding the twisted pair conductors. There are 4 conductor versions of this cable that may be individually shielded twisted pairs. I will have to look into that.

I have used it for RCA cables in two different ways. In my BMW 525iT, I used the twisted pair as signal positive and negative from an Audio Control Four.1 preamp to Audio Control EQX in the back. The Audio Control units were both configured with fully differential outputs and inputs. I just left the shield floating. I understand that the floating shield is not the best technique but in this application, it did not result in additional noise. FWIW, BMW uses unshielded twisted pair wiring from the OEM Head Unit to the Blaupunk amplifier in the rear and there is no noise.

Standard coax cable in this BMW always results in alternator noise. There are strong electrical fields radiated from the chassis because the battery is under the rear seat. Battery ground is not the same potential as alternator ground and this results in large, noisy currents flowing between the two. The higher the current draw from the battery, the stronger the radiated field.

I have also used the MIL Spec cable for RCA cables in other cars by just soldering both inner wires together to the center conductor of the RCA plug and using the shield for the ground. This does not offer much advantage over standard coax cable.

Slightly off topic but I have also used the MIL Spec cable in this manner to replace a knock sensor cable that went bad on my 1989 Toyota All Trac Turbo. That was a flimsy coax cable from the factory and the high under hood temps make it failure prone. The frequency range of the knock sensor is approximately 100-10 KHz. The teflon insulation and superior construction of the MIL Spec cable make it a very good solution.

[thematrimix]

I have been doing some research and found this cable to seem like a good option. Opinions
Gepco Gepco 61801EZ Single Pair 22 Gage Analog Audio Cable Bulk Audio Cable at Markertek.com

Here is the connectors that seem to be good price.
Neutrik USA Inc Neutrik RCA Plug with Gold Contacts RCA Connectors at Markertek.com

[ctnsupra1]

I've had decent luck with StarQuad as well though it is tough to work with. For short runs I've used the braided copper and braided silver wire from Home Grown Audio and used a copped shielding sleeve over it to keep noise down and that has seemed to work well.

[Kevlar]

I wanted to make my own thread for this, but I don't have enough posts, so I'm putting it in here because it's pertinent to the current discussion.

I'm planning on making my own RCA interconnects, so I've been doing a lot of reading on this board to figure out the best cable and the best method. It seems like lots of people use twisted pair shielded cable for interconnects, like the Gepco 61801, using one wire for signal, the other for ground, and connecting the drain (or, on a braided cable, the braided shield) to the ground on only one side. However, this tech note (www.rane(dot)com/note110.html) suggests that for a purely unbalanced connection, it's best to use a single-conductor cable and use the shield as a ground. Furthermore, BJC's subjective comparison here: http://www.bluejeanscable(dot)com/ar...mrejection.htm has a balanced cable (Belden 1800F) coming in last place when wired as such, as compared to some single-conductor coaxes. I see that one of the reasons for doing it like that is because it makes switching to a balanced setup easier in the future, but how much of a trade off is it? If I don't plan on switching to a balanced setup in the foreseeable future, would I be better off with a single-conductor coax, or is there something about the car environment that I'm missing, that makes the other setup somehow better?

[Kevlar]

Ok, I have 5 posts now, so I can post the URL's:

Sound System Interconnection

Hum Rejection in Unbalanced Audio Cables

[thematrimix]

Originally Posted by Kevlar

I wanted to make my own thread for this, but I don't have enough posts, so I'm putting it in here because it's pertinent to the current discussion.

I'm planning on making my own RCA interconnects, so I've been doing a lot of reading on this board to figure out the best cable and the best method. It seems like lots of people use twisted pair shielded cable for interconnects, like the Gepco 61801, using one wire for signal, the other for ground, and connecting the drain (or, on a braided cable, the braided shield) to the ground on only one side. However, this tech note (www.rane(dot)com/note110.html) suggests that for a purely unbalanced connection, it's best to use a single-conductor cable and use the shield as a ground. Furthermore, BJC's subjective comparison here: http://www.bluejeanscable(dot)com/ar...mrejection.htm has a balanced cable (Belden 1800F) coming in last place when wired as such, as compared to some single-conductor coaxes. I see that one of the reasons for doing it like that is because it makes switching to a balanced setup easier in the future, but how much of a trade off is it? If I don't plan on switching to a balanced setup in the foreseeable future, would I be better off with a single-conductor coax, or is there something about the car environment that I'm missing, that makes the other setup somehow better?

Interesting yes very interesting.

I read though this Sound System Interconnection and came to the conclusion that if one it to run say the Gepco 61801 there is several options.

1) run the black and red leaving the shield alone
2) run the black and red connecting the shield to the black on the source end
3) run the black and red connecting the shield to black on both ends
4) connect black and red as the hot and the shield and the ground
5) run two channels off one wire using the red and channel 1 and black and channel 2 and the shield as common ground

Note this is all from common sense as I am not an expert by any means. So now to the conclusion.

I see that most people opt for option 2 as it adds the idea of ground loop prevention and interference problems via the shield shielding and shield as a ground wire. Makes sense to me I could and very well may be wrong. On the other options. Option one seems ok to do aswell as you can get the wire stupid cheap really and the wire is twisted so good there as far as leaving the shield alone that does not hurt anything. Option 3 makes no sense to me as option 4 is a better way of doing it. Then there is option 5 which is very much related to option 4 and maybe the most cost effective way of doing things. I priced things earlier today and I was at about 30 for 6 individual 15ft cables. If one was to use option 5 that would chop off about 6~8 bucks off that price leaving you with total cost of 22 - 24 for 3 pair 15 ft cables. Note this only includes raw cable and connectors.

Opinions of my thoughts correct incorrect let me know. I am soon to make my own interconnects as well.

[xaman74]

I use a shielded 1266wire from Belden and works fine, i can´t notice any difference in sound compare to Stinger expert and Monster RCAs.

After i read this i confirm my selection.
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