Speaker cable lifters.


Hey gang. What are your takes on speaker cable lifters ? Is there any truth to this ? I was thinking about purchasing some for my Straightwire Crescendos. Which are very thick speaker cables btw also. Diameter is over 1 in. Also my B&W 800 Matrix speakers are also quad wired so there are about 2 speaker cables for ea speaker that sits on top of the other. Would that matter ? Thanks in advance. 

128x128Ag insider logo xs@2xtattooedtrackman

Given your amazing system. Absolutely. They are likely to make a small difference, but those add up. They are virtually free in comparison to any of our components. 
 

I’d still gently move your amps back. 
 

I tested them some thirty years ago… bought a bunch of ceramic electrical insulators for… I don’t remember $10 each. They have been in all my systems since. 

There’s this thread from a few weeks ago:

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/cable-elevators-5

If I were you, I’d skip past the naysayers and get some Tinker Toys and assemble your lifters on the cheap to see if you can hear a difference. They’d be able to hold the weight of your cables and if you do hear an improvement, then you can go onto something fancier or just leave it as is.

I got the idea of Tinker Toys after seeing a YouTube video of Danny over at GR Research saying they work for resolving systems. As for myself, I just hang them off my wall with 3M wall hooks since my SCs are thin and light.

I dare say, your speakers are aesthetically, the perfect fit for your room.

All the best,
Nonoise

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Thank you everyone. I appreciate all the nice things u said about my system. And I will definitely try them. 

I’ve never bothered, my cables are not in the league yours are.

You ought to be able to come up with some gizmo to use as a temporary test. My instinct: I would separate the two parallel cables by ____ (advice?) inches.

As a temporary test just use some one thing tall enough to lift the entire cable off the floor.

Vibration from music, cat noises, yer mama, police sirens, ocean waves, creepy footsteps of your impending doom, etc., are ever present in the air and no little elevators or tinker toys or anything else will stop that. The wires inside your speakers? Are they vibrating? Get in there and stop it! Tinker toys indeed.

I prefer Lincoln Logs. Don't laugh, they can n

be built up just like Tinker Toys!

#toddsyr.  I agree!  Lincoln logs will absorb more of those nasty vibrations.  Be sure and finish them with a neutral sounding wax.

Tried them and they only made it easier to dust the floor. They look neat but I am on a concrete slab with wood floors, did nothing for sound. But hey they may work for you. In comparison to other suggestions (fuses and the like) Tinker Toys, Lincoln Logs and wood blocks are cheap.  

The concept of cable "lifters" has an interesting history. They were apparently first proposed by Enid Lumley, a reviewer for TAS. This link adds a little more to the story:

https://positive-feedback.com/audio-discourse/bunking-cable-lifters/

It's a relatively inexpensive tweak to try. If you hear a difference in your system, in your room, with your ears, then that's all that really matters.

The OP has a high level system in what looks to be a challenging space.

Are room acoustics- damping/diffusion fully addressed? The ceiling/speaker arraignment has to be affecting overall SQ?

Leaning forward and eye squinting will probably have the same effect as cable lifters. Naturally-YMMV.

Expanding on wolfies comment- the entire room floor needs to be on a Minus K isolation platform for "true" vibration elimination.

@tablejockey Yes. This room has always been a challenge to work with. This is the only room in my home that I can possibly have a dedicated audio room. This room is far from a perfect audio room. But at least I do have a dedicated room. I just have to make the best of what I can possibly do with it. I have not really addressed all the damping / diffuser areas in room. But I did just by a new 2 in solid tiger maple rack and 3 in sold maple amp platforms from Timbernation. About my floor. It is a solid oak wood floor with area rugs laid out. W/ plants behind speakers on corner of walls. Soundproof thick drape for my downstairs door with window panels. I really would like to call up a professional to come to look at my room and see what I really need for wall and ceiling diffusers / dampers. Also I do have a few canvas framed painting on my walls to also help with sound dampening.

I’d tried ceramic, wood, laser printed, popsicle sticks, etc. On tile or wood flooring, raising my cables mainly keep dust bunnies from clinging and very little else. On carpeted floor, I do hear a difference especially during dry winters. I found them most effective with non-shielded cables, speaker and interconnect cables alike. If one takes the extra effort to use cable risers, he/she will mostly make the extra effort to dress their cables properly. Such as separating power, interconnects, and speaker cables from each other. Usually an inch or so will do. Should cables touch,try one’s best to cross signal and power cables at reasonable angle. More perpendicular the better. I humbly believe cable dressing pays the biggest dividend. 

Finally, I came across and currently using a few Rebar Chairs in parts of my cable web. Cheap and effective. Many styles and heights to choose. One with perfect slot to slip in my Analysis Plus speaker cable yet able to hold a two inch diameter power cable with slight modification.

Hope you find this useful.
 

 

There is a option where as good as Zero Cost can be outlay to experience a propped or suspended Cable.

Usually the material used to contact the Cable is a organic origin instead of a synthetic substance, but who really knows.

I suspend my Speaker Cables with a Cotton Thread.

For Cables with a substantial girth like the ones being referred to, maybe a heavy duty Cotton Thread will be the required type if suspension is to be considered.

Looking at your system, there are plenty of attractive pedestals designs that would compliment it, my approach to all supporting equipment for Audio Ancillaries is very cost effective, robust and basic avoiding anything Heath Robinson. 

I built my own from 1x4 lumber. I drilled a 3" hole spaced every 12" then cut through the holes and you have a 3" x 1.5" hole to lay your cable in. I nailed a 1" x @' on the bottom of each for support and stained them all. I took about an hour to make about ten of them. The cost was ]probably $10 in parts.

' I really would like to call up a professional to come to look at my room and see what I really need for wall and ceiling diffusers / dampers'

A mic/room EQ program will show what going on. Just a guess, but diffusion is the issue to manage?

Controlling the room over tweaky addons would be seem to be the more important thing to address.

 

 

 

 

@tablejockey I agree, that getting the room set up to be a very good interface for the produced sound energy is a high importance.

Looking at the OP's set up, there is the possibility such a practice of getting the room set up to interface with the Speaker is addressed.  

As energy is always transferred, it is best to discover the methods that can be adopted to transform the unwanted energies into a form that has the least least impact on the quality of the Sonic being produced.

The interest in audio equipment will nearly always lead to investigations about how to eek the betterment, even the smallest of change, if seen to be resulting in a betterment, can end up being sought by certain individuals.

When I suspended my Speaker Cables with a Cotton Thread, they were no longer in contact with anything but the Terminations and Cotton Material.

Did suspending the Cables make a difference? It is not certain, but there are Cables in use that are in free space, and when I tidied up the Systems Cable Loom,  ensuring that there was a minimum of crossing over cables such a Power, Interconnect and Speaker, the improvement in the sonic produced was very noticeable.

Again something that can be achieved for next to nothing in monies outlaid, and highly recommended to take the time to put into practice.         

I use my own homemade cable lifters.  I start with ceramic isolators that I bought at Tractor Supply supported by small bungee cord stretched over two wooden dowels.  The base is a flat square of wood that supports the dowels.  Very effective and after staining they don't look bad.  My cables are about 5" off the floor.  I made  8 risers for the speaker cables and 16 risers for my interconnects from the preamp to the amps.  Power cords rest on the previous wooden blocks, which are lower to keep them from touching the speaker cables or interconnects where they cross.

I experimented some years back with wooden bowls that we had.  I heard a difference so I cut of some lumber into wooden blocks.  From there I came up with my design using the ceramic isolators.  Not as techy looking as those AQ cable risers but much less expensive.  My design idea was to use the bungie for mechanical isolation and the ceramic and wood for static/electrical isolation.

I originally had carpet.  When I installed the hardwood floor I kept the cable risers in place.  I have never repeated the listening tests with and without risers on my hardwood floor.  You know, if it isn't broken, don't fix it.

@tattooedtrackman - the answer depends on

  1. your cables -
    • you said they are thick,which suggests a complex cable geometry
    • They probably take into account the effect of different floor coverings
    • I doubt if risrs would make any improvement
  2. your floor covering
    • if you have hardwood without any soft covering then risers would probably make little difference, depending on the cable
    • Carpe or rug - wool is best (see below)
  3. your floor - wood, concrete, ceramic
    • eithere of these woud probably not impact your sound

Man Made fibers are the worst and putting some air between the cables and the floor convering may be beneficial (depends on cable geometry)

I made my own from chlidrens alphabet blocks (from a dollar store) glued to a small cereamic tile for stabiity. on opposite sides I glued two pieces of craft sticks to hold the cable in place.

  • the tile is 2" square and bought in a sheet for a shower floor - from home depot

Not the most elegeant solution, but people like their simplicity and being wood/ceramic does not impact performance.

They made very little difference from when the cables sat on the broadloom, but my cables are not prone to the type of interference that can occur in this situation.

I’m all about keeping costs low and looks are not important, so the blocks were ideal for me

I would not place bi-wired cables on top of each other - try to seperate them by about 2 inches

Regards - Steve

 

@williewonka   Hey Steve. Thank you for your input. I appreciate it and maybe I’ll try something like that and make my own. 👍