Why are MC's usually more expensive than MM's?

[Vinny]

The wire on an MM coil is incredibly fine, to get a dc resistance of 500 Ohms still takes 100s of feet.

35AWG/39SWG copper wire has a resistance of 140R/100m. That is 132 microns - which is still pretty thick - roughly 5 thou, so appreciably thicker than normal copier paper which is 3 or 4 thou and around double the diameter of a tungsten filament in a GLS lamp (in the region 47-50SWG), which is a coiled coil.

Coils (of wire) have been machine-wound for many decades - if they aren't, they have highly variable electrical/magnetic/inductance characteristics - even at the level of lamp filaments.

(Resistance of a wire is inversely proportional to the cross-sectional area of the wire, so halve the diameter, and the resistance goes up 4-fold.)

 

[sq225917]

Once you get under 32 gauge the maths on resistance and current capacity falls apart and it stops scaling in the same way it does with larger sizes according to an old reference book I have.

Perhaps it's measurement error though.

 

[Vinny]

Once you get under 32 gauge the maths on resistance and current capacity falls apart and it stops scaling in the same way it does with larger sizes according to an old reference book I have.

Perhaps it's measurement error though.

It is all rule of thumb as in a coil, impedence will soar.

 

[a.palfreyman]

Average wage now is something around £530 per week.

Like to know where I went wrong...

 

[chartz]

Nothing will ever justify a cartridge that is the cost of a car. But then, I can't afford them anyway. Who can?

 

[crimsondonkey]

Why do they need justifying? The market for these is clearly there for manufacturers to supply them, and the demand and money is there to purchase them, end of story.

The only justification if there is one, is an individual decision about whether a particular cartridge at various price points offer sufficient value to you to buy it or not.