WOW !! I wonder how many other cords are made this way?? |
I bet all cables and tweaks by ANY manufacturer, not just Granite Audio, also have such high margins. |
These cost estimates are not even close to our actual costs. If you can supply me with those toroid filters for 25 cents then I would like to order 5000 of them. It takes 6 hours of handcraft labor to build one cord. It takes 9 days on our special custom burn-in box before these cables are ready to ship. All of the braid and shrink are mil-spec and cost so much more than your estimate. And, finally our performance is tops. 98% of the customers who try these cables on our in-home audition program keep them. Over 60% of them buy more. The truth is that this is a fine handcrafted power cord and performs very well in the best high-end systems.
Don Hoglund, President Granite Audio |
In response to Don Hogland at Granite.
1.Why is your conductor so cheap? Why not use PTFE coated
silver plated 10 gauge copper instead of high voltage exterior extension cord?
2. If it takes 6 hr for labor you must be loosing a lot of money on these cables.
3.The toroids can before in either Allied electronic or Newark electronic.You can simply go to Ferrites webpage and they can direct you.
4.This is a game of conspicuous consumption Don and you know it. It must be expensive or it can’t be good because I as a consumer do not know squat about what actually is happening and I depend upon the good will of the saleman to inform me.
You have proven this by using simple cheap materials that one can get any local electrical supply and "transformed" it into a high grade audiophile component.
All I am asking is why such cheap conductor? |
I am extremely offended to have my six hours of meticulous handcrafted labor belittled by any claim that it should take only 1/12 that amount of time. I'm also offended by any further claims that we are using anything less than the best possible materials for our high performance power cords. Okay, had to get that out.
I am so dedicated to providing the best quality-value products to my customers that we delayed marketing our #555 cable design for 8 months until the WattGate IEC plugs were available. We tried the other brands of IEC's and in my opinion none of them were up to my standards for coming out with a new Granite Audio product. I got test samples of the WattGate from Ray Kimber after meeting with him in person and seeing how well engineered these plugs are. We had test samples even before they were UL approved. We waited for the UL approval because I would not sell a cable with non-UL Approved parts. We had plugs from the first WattGate production run. They were much more expensive at first because Ray had to recover his tooling costs. The price dropped on later runs and we reduced our cord prices too.
Now, please allow me to respond to specific questions/allegations.
1. Our cord is expensive and very flexible compared to other's. It is very high-purity copper with 123- 30AWG strands in the #555 and 312- 30AWG strands in the #560 which is 10AWG total. It is UL Approved, CSA Certified, MSHA Approved, and rated to 600 volts. All those approvals cost money and I insist on having them for my customer's safety. Many of the high-end cords by other makers do not have any of these approvals and they compromise the customer's safety and their homeowner's insurance liability. Anyone who defeats the ground on our cable is compromising everyone's safety and risking serious electrical shock and a fire that their insurance may not cover. Please don't modify our cables in any way.
We do not use silver-plated copper with PTFE insulation for many good reasons. First of all I, and everyone I know who has compared it, think it has inferior sonics in Granite Audio products when compared to other materials. We've tested it in our speakers internal wiring, speaker cables, interconnect cables, power cords, and internal component wiring with unfavorable results. All of our customers who have compared our #555 and #560 cables to the silver-plated PTFE cords in their own systems have preferred our cord. Everyone has their own preferences and I am sure that many people like the sound of the PTFE cords, but I don't. Silver is a better conductor than copper and frequencies that travel in the silver will be louder. Since the high frequencies tend to travel on the silver surface due to the skin-effect, they will be louder. This may explain why many people think that PTFE cords sound too bright. This can be a real problem in power cords especially where you are trying to block the high-frequency RFI/EMI noise from getting into your component. Silver plating the wire only helps the transmission of these frequencies when that's the last thing you want to do.
PTFE is stiff. It make the cord stiff, especially in 10AWG. It makes it very difficult to install the cord and keep it connected at both ends. Several times we used a $1,000.00 PTFE cord at meetings of the Arizona Audiophile Society and always had to bring a collection of boxes and risers to support the cord and keep it from falling out of the wall socket and out of the component IEC. PTFE is corrosive to copper. That is why the copper is silver plated to protect it from the PTFE. At the end of the wire where it is stripped there can be a loss of integrity of the silver coating and the bare copper can become vulnerable to corrosion. I want my products to be maintenance free to the extent possible and to sound as good 50 years from now as they do today. With all due respect to the many people who like silver-plated PTFE, It's just not up to my standards.
2. Yes, we lose money on the #555 cable. It is a promotional loss-leader. The sonics of the #555 are so great that we more than recover the loss when our good #555 customers discover our quality and buy our other products. Also, the #555 makes our components sound so good that I want to make sure the cost doesn't keep any of our component customers from buying them and getting the maximum performance from us.
3. Our proprietary toroids should not be confused with ferrites. The toroids are much more expensive, much larger, and much more effective for audio applications. Our toroids are self-shielding due to their shape, while ferrites are not. This allows us to put the toroids at the ends of the cord where they are so much more effective than ferrites in the middle of the cord. Also, our toroids have a much higher saturation tolerance than ferrite which is critical on high power components like our tube power amps. And last of all, our toroids filter down to 1 MHz where the average ferrite is only filtering down to 40 MHz. 40 MHz is helpful on ham radios, but of limited benefit in audio.
4. This comment is so absurd and offensive to me that I'm not responding to it.
Cheap conductor? You loved our performance enough to attempt to copy our design?
Part of the high-performance of all our cables comes from the meticulous handcrafting and the extreme care we take in the terminations. I've spent many years learning my craft and I can't tell you how much I enjoy music or how rewarding it is for me to be able to make a living building products that help others enjoy their favorite music more too.
I extend my many sincere thanks to everyone who has tried a Granite Audio product. I've been enriched by it and I hope you have too.
Sincerely, Don Hoglund, President Granite Audio. |
Bravo.Don.Inasmuch as I dislike "infomercials" on the sight;I certianlly understand(and enjoyed) yours. A man;A company's reputation were on the line.Having spoken to a few "wires" companies, designers,I understand the termination is one of the main keys.Yes, you can DIY;save some $$,but I'm sure you will end up with less. |
First all I was not trying to offend...I was trying to inform. I should have kept to the facts as I saw them and not made any value judements. My apologies Don.
I stand corrected...The compromises you have made to make a safe, affordable, quality product in this price range at a $loss are to be commended. However....
1.The argument the PTFE is stiff, is a weak one . Thick rubber over the PTFE will absorb any torsional energy as will the shrink tubing.
2.The argument that PTFE attacked copper more than the vulcanization process(high pressure steam!!) involved in making high voltage extension cable (per a Belden Rep) is also weak. PTFE is quite inert can stand high temperatures and has very residual solvent comparded to rubber.
I have to admit you explanation of the silver plating of the wire to prevent the corossion of the copper sounds logical given that the real need in PTFE wire is the poperties of the PTFE and not of the conductor itself.(Temperture) Rubber stinks at extreme temps. I am not sure...I am not you are sure either.
3. The torriod thing.. I am wrong.:( 4. I copied your design until I started using 10 gauge silver plated hook up wire (Olympic military grade)with Belden Hospital Male and Marinco IEC. 5. I re-sold one of your cables on Audiogon not long ago for $105
6. I have sacrificed my ability to sell the other one with these notes. Will you buy it back for the $190 I paid too you over Audioweb? Or upgrade it? It is an older version without the torroids or the Wattagate IEC.
I guess the reason you chose the conductor you did was because it is UL approved...a good choice for a businessman.
My apologies ...the see the Emperor... and he is wearing more cloths than I am. Just barely. |
That's ok,I can stand some more minuses. A thoughtful thread on this subject would not have a brand name as a title, nor singled the brand, within the thread. I don't own this brand;I own many others,so the construction of power cords in general is an interesting subject. |
Don, I appreciate your well thought out statements on the subject at hand. I am in particular agreement with your comments on silver plated copper. From my experience, it simply sounds bad. I am curious as to your assertion that PTFE(polytetraflouroethylene, aka teflon) is corrosive to copper. From where are you drawing this opinion? |
Nealb has informed us that the cable he owns is made up of a cheap conductor. Don Hogland has made no aurgument that is the conductor nealb mentioned. his aurgument is sound...safety and UL listing. See,Quest for Sound feed back,"Granite Audio 555 Power cord was just inexpensive Carol 14/3 wire +fancy plugs
2-24-01 Williame for a second opinion.
http://audiogo1.iserver.net/cgi-bin/classa5.pl?.
0&1&adlr&Questforsound&home&
The above confirms Nealbs assertion that indead the cable is inexpensive. See http://search.newark.com/part_detail.phtml?PART%5FID=250&VID=250&10005=04F3886 at $102.57/250' or 41c/ft. This confirm his price.
Even if the rest of his ramble is... just that RAMBLE, do you want to pay $24-48/ft for 41C/f cable? |
I am a civil engineer who took electrical theory twice in college (and not because I enjoyed it so much the first time), so I can't really delve into electircal principles. You wanna argue about bridges, then we're on.
I do have good ears though. The granite power cord I bought from Quest for Sound about a month ago gave me tighter and deeper bass. I suspect I could have shelled out a grand for another type, but I do have my limits.
It improved the sound of my system. I got what I was looking for.
Did I pay too much? No, I paid what I was willing to pay.
Mitch |
Graniteaudio - As you are professional line cord designers, I would appreciate any information you could provide regarding the testing proceedures you use to determine if one cord or design change is better than another. |
I second Stevemj's request. It would be most interesting to learn more about the properties of power cords. |
Get an Absolute Power Cord. It's challenging every power cord on the market regardless of price and it costs $39.95! |
I'll match my $8 12-gauge power cord up against any 14, 16, or 18-gauge or smaller power cord. |
Yes, and you will get burned if you do it against any of the ones that I own. |
Really?? Where are you located, Dekay? We'll see who gets burned. |
Please, no, not another war..... |
702: I live in the real world as opposed to the windmills of your mind. Technically, I live in West Hollywood, CA and you are welcome to drop by for a shootout, if you feel that you are man enough. I personally cannot travel due to medical reasons, so the ball is in your park. My modest SET based system will be up and running in six weeks time and will easily differentiate between most cables, some of them do sound very similar, which you should already know if you have taken the time and effort to listen (even my 14 year old godson hears the difference on blind tests). Put up or shut up. |
Most cable manf. have many more cost than just the cost of cable. If you are a Kimber or Cardas you have cost associated with equipment and research. Since we are not talking about a product that is going to sell millions over it's production life the cost of this overhead has to be spread over a smaller number of products sold. The end result is a product that cost very much more than the materials involved in production. I'm not going to argue over the particulars of the Granite Audio cables because I know nothing about them.
One thing though...just because a material is inexpensive (ie. the cable) does not necessarily mean that it isn't effective. I use PVC (gasp!) coated cable on power cables that cost me about .80/ft in quantity. It works wonderfully... I use a Pass & Seymour 5266-X which I buy for around $5 in quantity and the Schurter 4300.0603 IEC is about the same. I have about $20.00 in parts for each cable I make and maybe 45-60 minutes in labor (I've gotten much quicker than when I started). If you count labor (at $35) as part of the equation the cable cost is up to let's say $55. I also have had to buy tools and I have certain amounts of time in acquiring materials (purchasing) and shipping product. On top of that for every cable I sell I spend a certain amount of time (like now) interacting with customers. Let's add $10 just to grab a number out of the air (for most manf. who don't build cables in their basement and garage the cost is MUCH higher). Let's adjust the cost up to $65. Now if I want to make any money basic business 101 says that I have to sell it for more than I payed for it. :) If I sell through a dealer he/she has to make their penny also. Let's guess that the standard mark-up is to just about double the price. I should sell my cable for about $130.00 to the dealer and the dealer will probably double the price once more. Maybe on the order of $260.00 for my cable that cost $20 in parts. This is sobbering to people who only see the price of the cable. People start screeming rip-off! but it really isn't. If someone is charging too much people shouldn't buy them.. If a manf. is making too much money competition abounds and other people will start making cables to compete and hence drive price down. We live in a society that has more and cheaper high quality products available than anytime in history. Why bitch about it? If you want to build your own cables go for it... There is a learning curve and you will make some mistakes. If you put some time into it and have the necessary tools available you can build the same cables cheaper unless you count your time. If you count your time.. you will find that you are paying much more for that cable you built than if you went out and bought something... You will also have a better chance of not ending up with a dud if you buy a built product. If you like to experiment and DIY you can end up with good stuff but you really have to work at it. Most DIYers have more money in their system (accounting for time) than the people who buy their equipment retail. |
Kevperro summed things up pretty well. Too bad most people still won't understand why prices are what they are.
They should really be mad about the $15 pricetag for CDs and $30 for DVDs! Those things only cost 1 cent to make! |
Dekay: You okay with double-blind testing? |
Kevperro: Most cable companies don't even make their own wire, but buy it from the catalogs of the manufacturers. With all the "research" costs, how is it none can tell us why they would make a difference? |
702: As long as I am allowed to use my ears, yes. |
When I was in the audio equipment manufacturing business our rule of thumb for the retail price was five times the cost of parts. We got about 60% and the dealer got the other 40% of the retail price. We had hundreds of parts in the bill of material to assemble, product advertising, rep commisions and warranty expenses. |
All I have to add is that I tried the 555's & sent them back. They were lame from day one; breakin for several hundred hours was of no help. I was supposed to receive a "full refund" but they withheld 10%; not that it was any big deal but was certainly not as-advertised. Was then solicited to audition another model 'money up-front, fully refundable' (fool me twice = shame on me) so no thank you. |
That's not true, Bob Bundus. Why must you lie about your refund amount and my offer to send our better cord at no extra cost to you?
You received a refund exactly as advertised. You ordered two cords by fax on 5-11-2000 charged to your mastercard. The cords shipped on 5-11-2000. On 5-21-2000 you sent me a very nice letter stating the things you liked about our cord and the things you didn't like, and you asked to return them for a refund minus shipping cost of $7 and credit card bank fee of 3% (not 10%). I processed your refund on 5-30-2000 and only deducted the $7 shipping plus $12 bank card fee as specified by your letter and our advertised audition return policy.
I offered to send you two of our Model #560 cords at no extra cost to you unless you kept them. I offered to pay the shipping expenses both ways even if you didn't keep them, and not charge any extra to your card during the extra audition period.
I have your fax, letter, and all emails on file to prove I'm telling the truth. Shame on you for lying, Bob. |
|
Dekay: Good. BTW, there's nothing else to use but your ears in DBT. Probably a "same-different" method would be best for this situation. Agreed? |
702: I do not understand "same-different". All of the different PC's that I "have" sound different. If two sounded the same I would sell the more expensive one and keep the cheaper one. LOL. |
Dekay: "Same-different" means that on each listening trial, you judge whether the system sounds the same as the previous trial, or different, without being told which PC is being used. Strictly by listening. After, say, 25 trials, your scoring is compared to what is recorded by the person doing the cable swapping. If you got 12 or 13 correct out of 25, then you might as well have just flipped a coin to make your decisions.
But if you got even 17 correct out of 25, then there's less than a 1-in-20 chance that you could've just guessed and gotten that many right. In that case, you would have shown a statistically very significant likelihood that you heard a difference between the PCs. In other words, you would've backed up your claim. |
I get it now. Would you care to do it with speakers, CD players and DACs as well? |
