Hookup wire

[Tubetec]

I got a surplus batch of Ptfe insulated stranded silver , horrible to work with any kind of bend at the solder point ,like when your installing or unstalling the pcb board or jack/xlr socket fatigues the silver to the point where its only a bend away from failure . In a tube mic where the wiring wont ever be shifted in that manner , silver ptfe is appropriate .
A few times I went to the jewelery maker and got solid silver wire off a reel , a left over of stripped ptfe insulation is easily slipped over , its perfect for wiring across the valve base .

Im very much in favour of shock mounting tubes these days , and not only in mics , a first stage preamp tube in a combo guitar amp might get enough vibration from the mains transformer via the chassis to induce noise physically in the electrodes eroding your noise floor when the tube becomes microphonic or at high gain ,if your tube is on a compliant mounting it has to withstand less vibration from the speaker in the first place , what goes around comes around and you extend the usable life of the tube by an order of magnitude . The biggest cause of failure in the early stages of tube guitar amps is microphony in my experience . Power tubes can also become microphonic, tell tale signs are. a horrendous howl around between pickup ,amp and speaker, a sonic din at a certain frequency and Im not talking about the German standard .

Might catch ye over brewery in a bit ,
cheers

 

[13engrsapper]

I only have black irradiated XLPVC in 18 ga tinned. available - runs about 20 cents a foot. the process of irradiating the PVC transforms it from a thermoplastic to a thermoset - it behaves quite differently, but still has a low melt point. I personally still like the XL-ETFE stuff.

 

[Doug_]

My strong suggestion is Tefzel (ETFE) tin plated wire - I think (iirc) the mil spec code is Mil-W-22759/16. Use 24, 26 or 28AWG for general hook up work.
Teflon - difficult to strip, requires very sharp correctly sized or best of all thermal stripping tools
Silver platting - only really used for high temperatures where the tin may reflow, also silver can tarnish and where this occurs makes soldering very difficult if not impossible. Not the best for hookup wire.

 

[MicMaven]

I. Power tubes can also become microphonic, tell tale signs are. a horrendous howl around between pickup ,amp and speaker, a sonic din at a certain frequency and ...

Might catch ye over brewery in a bit , cheers

A) Gee, fellers ... I thought that was what gave my guitar that special sound !

B) Meeting at the brewery sounds ... um ... good!

James

 

[user 133392]

I've been looking at hook-up wire and found these 22G 7/30 strand at Newark in Multicomp. They're $6.49 US per 100ft spool.

Datasheet: https://www.farnell.com/datasheets/2875230.pdf

Don't know anything about the quality - I've always used Alpha hook-up wire but its gotten crazy expensive. I do have a lot of multicore cable I've considered harvesting for hook-up wire. To spare the multicore I think I'll order a few spools of colors I'm getting low on and find out.

 

[Matador]

Like what is hinted at earlier: it's rated at 300V (if you don't do tube equipment it's fine), and it's PVC insulation, which will shrink/melt when soldered. If those aren't issues then that hook-up wire is fine.

 

[scott2000]

I got my first spool of janky wire from some guitar pedal place last year. Some clearance 24G stuff that seems to break from the solder joint easily after a couple too many wiggles of it.... Maybe it was too old? idk....I've used some prehistoric wire before with no issues.... storage issues?

 

[user 133392]

I've been looking at hook-up wire and found these 22G 7/30 strand at Newark in Multicomp. They're $6.49 US per 100ft spool.

Datasheet: https://www.farnell.com/datasheets/2875230.pdf

Don't know anything about the quality - I've always used Alpha hook-up wire but its gotten crazy expensive. I do have a lot of multicore cable I've considered harvesting for hook-up wire. To spare the multicore I think I'll order a few spools of colors I'm getting low on and find out.

I received the Multicomp wire from Newark today and it seems to be fairly good quality.
The Country of Origin is marked US.

Strip-ability was good.
I stripped back 0.2", tinned it at 700°F, and the shrinkage/pull-back to 0.22" wasn't significant.
Not a bad alternative for low voltage use.

 

[jp8]

I find myself increasingly using mounting wire with silicone insulation. With the right (sharp) stripping tool it's easy to strip, insulation does not shrink when soldering, it's extremely flexible and most importantly: it does not break when soldered directly to a PCB due to the high number of strands those silicon insulated wires often have. The wire I use has 40 strands, but with 11 strands and up the wires already break less often. Most standard PVC insulated AWG24 hookup wires have just 7 strands, which break easily at PCB level. Especially when soldered in plated holes. You will find affordable silicon wire on eg Amazon and Aliexpress.

The one I use: Haerkn Electric AWG24 https://amzn.eu/d/cSDUgeP

 

[TwentyTrees]

I find myself increasingly using mounting wire with silicone insulation. With the right (sharp) stripping tool it's easy to strip, insulation does not shrink when soldering, it's extremely flexible and most importantly: it does not break when soldered directly to a PCB due to the high number of strands those silicon insulated wires often have. The wire I use has 40 strands, but with 11 strands and up the wires already break less often. Most standard PVC insulated AWG24 hookup wires have just 7 strands, which break easily at PCB level. Especially when soldered in plated holes. You will find affordable silicon wire on eg Amazon and Aliexpress.

The one I use: Haerkn Electric AWG24 https://amzn.eu/d/cSDUgeP

Yep, I use that or an equivalent. It's really nice to work with.

 

[user 133392]

Thanks for that. In the US something like this: https://www.amazon.com/24-Gauge-Wire-Silicone-Insulation/dp/B087TJNJZS It's about 9 cents/foot. The 40 strand is likely to be less microphonic.

In 22G 7/30 I found huge price variations between Mouser and DigiKey on Alpha 3051-series ($43.48/100ft vs. $34.56) and DigiKey and Newark on Carol C2016A ($19.31/100ft vs $64.29). I've have both 3051 and C2016A in stock and the MultiComp looks, feels and works almost identical to the Carol C2016A.

Excluding the MultiComp the DigiKey C2016A pricing of $19.31/100 seems like a bargain compared to the other sources of Alpha or Carol 300V PVC wire.

 

[Nick Nack]

It's luxurious to work with for sure. Only thing I find is that the sleeving can be cut by over-enthusiastic tightening of cable ties.

My day job forbids the soldering of stranded wire straight into PCBs. We are required to use bootlace ferrules.

 

[Gold]

My day job forbids the soldering of stranded wire straight into PCBs. We are required to use bootlace ferrules.

I use ferrules a lot. Mostly into terminal blocks. I recently got a bunch of ebay special terminal blocks. I’ve found that unlike Phoenix brand terminal blocks the cheap ones don’t like the flat my Wiha 32945 crimp pliers leave. The flat needs to be horizontal to the connector or it wont go in. The kind of crimp pliers that do a round crimp are much more expensive. Like a Knipex 97-53-14. I’m not sure it’s worth it.