New speaker cables recommendations sought

Duelund  12 gauge or Western Electric 10 gauge speaker cables DIY. Warm and full bodied with big stage size.  Music presented with a nice sense of ease and natural flow.  Can be made for under $350 DIY..  I have made many dozens of these. 

@grannyring I read some of your comments in other discussions, wondering if the 16 gauge Duelund might be better suited. I think for the price, I might be more inclined towards DC’d Cardas cables…but thanks.

@audiowav I’d like to audition the van damme cables but there’s only 1 dealership in the US, and they don’t appear to offer much more the the blues. I created saved searches on Audiogon and eBay, maybe will get lucky there.

I would use the Duelund 12 gauge Polycast. Cost is low and they are even warmer than the cloth version.  Use bare wire for connections. Cost under $100.  

For branded cables be aware that some high current solid state amp designs can go into an oscillation state when used with speaker cables having a very high capacitance, which can result in damage to the internal circuits

I have witnessed this with Ayre and Gryphon amps when using the TOTL Cardas cables, such as the Clear and Clear Beyond cables.

Both amps had to be repaired and were out of commission for a couple of months.

Unfortunately, Cardas no longer posts the metrics for their cables.

Fortunately their lower level cables do not have the extreme levels of capacitance as the Clear (@ 278 pf pf/ft) and Clear Beyond.

Having said all of that, there are some people that report no problems with high end Cardas cables on high current solid state designs, but that does not mean their amps are NOT oscillating, it just means the threshold has not been exceeded. They could also be using very short cables

The oscillations occur above the audible spectrum, so there is no audible warning as to when the threshold is about to be breached.

Maybe something to be considered - Steve