12 ft pair of thick speakers cables?? Can they be cut downt to a 6 ft pair??


I have a 12 foot pair of Harmonic Technology Pro-11 Plus speaker cables. Can they be cut down to a 6 ft pair and re-terminated with WBT banana jacks. The 12 foot pair is awkward and difficult to place, and WILL NOT stay put on "Porcelain  Cable Elevators"   

I  really like the cables and don't want to necessarily sell them  The "new"  Harmonic Technology company blew me off when I ask if they could do it??   Are there outside services companies that will do it for a reasonable price??. 

Thanks,  SJ


sunnyjim

Showing 1 response by almarg

Moebuster 1-22-2017
I read on Mapleshade Audio list of audio tweaks that speaker cables should be 10 feet or longer. The 10 foot plus cable supposedly sounds way better than cable less than 10 feet. You can go to the Mapleshade audio website for more information.

Geoffkait 1-23-2017
Wasn’t it John Curl and Bob Crump who opined that speaker cables should be a specific length, around 5 feet, perhaps to minimize reflections traveling down the cable, something like that?

Signal reflection effects may occur in a cable as a result of impedance mismatches between the cable and the components it is connecting, and are likely to occur mainly at frequencies that are much too high to be directly audible. Or even to be reproduced by most speakers. In the case of a speaker cable any effects those reflections may have at audible frequencies, and also any sonic effects of RFI that may be picked up by the cable, are likely to be the result of their effects on the amplifier, and in particular as a consequence of their introduction into the feedback loop of the amplifier, if it has one.

So any such effects will be highly dependent on the feedback provisions and also the bandwidth of the amplifier that is being used, among several other characteristics of its design, as well as on the impedance characteristics of the components and the cable that are involved. As well as on the length of the cable, which will affect the spectral characteristics of what is introduced into the feedback loop of the amplifier. All of which adds up to a lot of unpredictability and system dependency. While all or nearly all other parameters and sonic effects of a speaker cable, **when and if significant**, such as resistance, inductance, capacitance, skin effect, dielectric absorption, etc., are proportional to length.

So it would seem highly unlikely that a specific length can be defined for speaker cables that would be optimal under all or even most circumstances. Also, it would seem that **if** the goal is for the cable to convey the signal in as accurate a manner as possible, chances are that in most cases the shorter the cable is the better.

Finally, I’ll add that having read numerous threads that have appeared here and elsewhere over the years on the question of long speaker cables/short interconnects vs. long interconnects/short speaker cables, my perception has been that the preponderance of the anecdotal evidence and reports has been in favor of long interconnects/short speaker cables, although admittedly not by an overwhelming margin.

Regards,
-- Al