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The "Zero" DIY interconnect

K

Kit Taylor

Well-Known Member
These are connectorless, pretty cheap and very easy to make, the only tool you need to know how to use being a pair of scissors. I've swapped them for all my interconnectscs for them and my Chord Anthems sound stiff, congested, hard and opaque by comparison.

Run a single strand of 0.5mm 4n silver wire through some PTFE tubing and fold the ends of the wire back over the tubing. I've used 3.05mm and 1.91mm diameter tubing. Cut a 2mm by 15mm rectangle out of the wider tubing to fit in an RCA socket, and wrap the narrower with a square piece of plumber's tape to ensure a snug fit. The conductor needs to be on the outside of the tape to make contact.

Ground the connection with a bit of mains cable attached to the RCA socket with a 6mm rubber ring. This stops hum but I don't now if quality is important here. Any ideas?

The Zeroes are thoroughly wholesome and devoid of "silvery" hifiness. The queer sound of some silver cables that has so irked the flat earth elite is apparently due to the way silver interacts with its insulator. Aswell as being simple the Zero design ensures the silver is in minimal contact with the PTFE tubing and that its main "dialectric" (I think that's the word) is air.

Try them they work, they're not voodoo bullshit after the fashion of the stacks of coins I've stuck all over my speakers.

Here are a couple of refinements -

With 1.91mm PTFE about an inch and 1/2 of plumbers tape will ensure a snug fit in the socket.

Don't bend the conductor flat against the PTFE. Bend it at a 45 degree angle so that it wedges against the inside of the socket.

And another

Don't bend the conductor back at all. It sounds better straight. If you use the right amount of plumbers tape you won't have any difficulty making a signal contact.

...and Another

Trying to get the cables to stick in the socket without bending is more trouble than it's worth.

I've made a new, even simpler interconnect to go between pre and power. Run some 1mm silver through 1.91mm PTFE. Squirting a bit of DeOxit down the tube should make it easier to slide it in*. Fold about 5mm of silver over each end and crimp it down, and then lift the protrubing silver away from the PTFE slightly. This helps the silver grip the RCA socket. You may need to waggle it about a bit to make a signal contact.

*fnarr fnarr
 
Run a single strand of 0.5mm 4n silver wire through some PTFE tubing and fold the ends of the wire back over the tubing. I've used 3.05mm and 1.91mm diameter tubing. Cut a 2mm by 15mm rectangle out of the wider tubing to fit in an RCA socket, and wrap the narrower with a square piece of plumber's tape to ensure a snug fit. The wire needs to be on the outside of the tape to make contact.
Click to expand...

Any chance of a pic? I'm sure I can't be the only one who hasn't the slightest idea what you mean!

Tony.
 
Unfortunately my digicam seems to have packed in. See if this makes more sense.

Take a length of PTFE tubing.

Run a length of silver wire through it.

The wire should be about 20mm longer than the tubing, so that 10mm of wire protrudes from each end.

Fold the protruding wire over the outside of the tubing to create a hook.

This stops the wire falling out of the tubing and makes it contact with the inside edge of the RCA socket.
 
This stops the wire falling out of the tubing and makes it contact with the inside edge of the RCA socket.
Click to expand...

So you are just using the wire itself to make the connection, not any phono plugs?

Tony.
 
That very intresting, as this is similar to the the results I have achieved using the same materials but in a different configuration. I used a double helix topology and Bullet plugs.

I've also had even better results with dissimilar dia solid conductors. Kit I have no problem with the name you have chosen, though this may create some confusion as I have a "zero cost" cable design.

If anyone is intrested please email me for the material cost, or contact Kit I'm certain he will tell you.

Kit how secure are the cables ....do they pop off?

I was looking at the 3mm tube and consider this could be used as the signal carrier, with the wire folded back over the end. The ground could be carried by the smaller tube running inside the larger, exiting 20mm from the end via a cut slot and secured to the ground ring of the socket using a suitable sized "o" ring.
Any thoughts ?
 
Hi zanash. Confusion with "zero cost?" Then let's call this one the "zero connector" cable.

The cable stays securely in the socket once installed (I think the relative stiffness of 3mm PTFE tube helps here), but be gentle handling it orthe signal breaks contact.

If the contact is unstable that's probably not good for the sound. The key issue is how to ensure the best possible contact using the the minimum of insulating material as per the zero ethos. Perhaps we could several short lengths of different diameter tube and slide them over one another to create a little stopper?

Running the smaller width of tubing through the larger sounds an elegent solution, though it would increase the amount of insulation the signal wire was exposed to. It might help by supporting the weight of the ground wire. It's quite tricky getting a strand of fine wire to take to an RCA socket, it always sems to want to wriggle free!

Multistranded mains cable works because it has a large surface area to grip the rca socket with. One interconnect well recieved in Hifi Posh used 1 signal wire and 3 grounds, maybe this configuration would work well?

My material costs plus postage have been about £30, with some material left over. Good value I'd say :)
 
To get rid of phono plugs, I'd been toying with the idea of soldering the end of a cable into a plug shape (the inner part) - no idea how to do this. Does anyone with better soldering skills than me think that this might be a possibility?
 
why not hardwire it in ? that'll remove 4 connectors per channel.

the only problem is that it makes moving your kit around more difficult ...
 
Use a similar design in reverse... Ie the hook of wire goes on the inside... This should then simulate the bullet design... all that is needed is a rubber pipe that will slip over the earth outer diameter... I'll measure up when I get home...

Zanash, just read your O ring thing... same idea... is it possible to get PTFE figure of 8 tubing ? is the earth not best as close to the signal as possible? for interferance? How much are the parts?

DOH! just read the Zenn site... amasing...
 
Kit,
I'm not sure what you are trying to achieve here.
If your goal is to make a poor physical and electrical connection then I would say you have succeeded. The poor quality of your
physical connection far outweighs any gains you might have
made by removing a phono connector.
 
Mark

How much physical contact is needed to make it an acceptable electrical contact. Surely with low level signals, provided it forms a constant contact between surfaces then there will be no problem.
 
speciality ?

I know this is on the earth side but the solder joint and different material all add impedance changes...

If electrical connections are anything like duct acoustics then an impedance change reflects some of the 'signal' back... in duct acoustics this is the pressure wave... I think it has a similar effect on cables...

An expert here will confirm or denign this...
 
I've not seen figure of eight PTFE sleeve, but it would not be imposible to makel it, two 3mm sleeves side by side held together with ptfe heat shrink, along its length or every 10cm or so.

I've been using dissimilar conductor sizes over the last few months and find that 0.5mm for signal and 1mm for the ground gives better results than either 0.5/0.5, 1.0/1.0, 1.0/0.5. I think this is similar to the eichmann ratio. This was achieved using a simple side by side topology, the sig and ground seperated by 4mm on average.

If the ptfe tube is split into quarters over the last 20mm it can be bent to fit around the ground collar of the socket the conductor is then bent over one of thes legs and the whole secured with an "o"ring. the other 3mm tube needs to be split so that it will enter the signal pin hole of the socket. The conductor is bent over in a similar way, the split has suficient spring to keep the connection firmly pushed against the signal connection. I've not actually connected at both ends yet this was a quick and dirty try it and see, if the method worked.
 
With 1.91mm PTFE about an inch (25mm in new money) of plumbers tape will ensure a snug fit in the socket.

Don't bend the coonductor flat against the PTFE. Bend it at a 45 degree angle. This means the wire wedges itself against the sides as you shove it right in the hole *chortle*

I think I need pic of your method zanash. How do you connect the signal to the socket when it's already covered by the ground?
 
"How much physical contact is needed to make it an acceptable electrical contact. Surely with low level signals, provided it forms a constant contact between surfaces then there will be no problem."

You need enough force/surface area to reduce the contact resistance. If you want to see how bad this connection method is,
try hooking up a composite video source (video connectors here in US are RCA types).
 
I think the interconnects sound better if you don't fold the conductor back over the sleeving at all. It takes a bit of fiddling to make it work, gravity holds the bottom end of the interconnect in contact but the top requires a bit of random fiddling.

The contact area is tiny, just the cross section of the end of the silver wire. This must sound reduce the variability of the signal contact as compared with a fold back, as the signalwire either connects with the RCA socket at a single point or doesn't connect at all.

Sound? Less veiled, more acoustic information and it shows when the vocal track could've done with another take.
 
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