Directionality of wire

shadorne5,793 posts08-01-2017 1:22pm@jea48

The speaker transducer moves forward and backward according to EMF acting on the voice coil - see Faraday’s law and Maxwells equations - so both +ve and -ve current direction along the speaker wire causes transducer movement.

A wire with directional properties would be a disaster for reproducing accurate audio. So Audioquest marketing mumbo jumbo is obviously just mumbo jumbo - Otherwise their products would not work .

The laws I want to talk about are the basic laws of electricity. I'm not
referring to circuit theory laws as described by Kirchhoff or Ohm but the
laws governing the electric and magnetic fields. These fields are
fundamental to all electrical activity whether the phenomenon is lightning,
electrostatic display, radar, antennas, sunlight, and power generation,
analog or digital circuitry.



These laws are often called Maxwell's equations. Light energy can be
directed by lenses, radar energy can be directed by waveguides and the
energy and power frequencies can be direct conductors. Thus we direct energy
flow at different frequencies by using different material.



For utility power the energy travels in the space between the conductors not
in the conductors. In digital circuits the signal and energy travel in the
spaces between the traces or between the traces and the conducting surfaces.
Buildings have halls and walls. People move in the halls not the walls.
Circuits have traces and spaces, signals and energy moves in the spaces not
the traces.



https://books.google.com/books?id=t7EB4PJMPVsC&pg=PT20&dq=moving+electrical+
energy,+ralph+morrison&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwisrtrwlIPNAhWkyoMKHX-MCsAQ6AEIL
DAD#v=onepage&q=moving%20electrical%20energy%2C%20ralph%20morrison&f=false

about this

The speaker transducer moves forward and backward according to EMF acting on the voice coil - see Faraday’s law and Maxwells equations - so both +ve and -ve current direction along the speaker wire causes transducer movement.

Again, it has nothing to do with we commonly call "current" which most visualize as electrons flowing back and forth. It simply doesn’t work that way. There is an electro-magnetic wave that transfers energy to the coil of the speaker. If applied to a resistor it creates heat. If applied to an inductor (coil) it creates a constantly changing magnetic field which pushes and pulls against a fixed magnet creating motion. Those stuck in a world of flowing electrons are just that, stuck there. Energy flows, electrons do not.

Quote

Paste quoted message here

nonoise          2,643 posts                                               08-16-2017 12:34pm

@jea48
Thanks for posting that. Stupidly, I’ve always tried to type the quote after clicking on the "quote" icon and it only worked a few times. I could never get back to regular font. Copy and Paste seems quite normal to most but to a dinosaur like me....

All the best,
Nonoise

Coaxial cable

Coaxial cable Poynting vector in a coaxial cable, shown in red.

For example, the Poynting vector within the dielectric insulator of a coaxial cable is nearly parallel to the wire axis (assuming no fields outside the cable and a wavelength longer than the diameter of the cable, including DC). Electrical energy delivered to the load is flowing entirely through the dielectric between the conductors. Very little energy flows in the conductors themselves, since the electric field strength is nearly zero. The energy flowing in the conductors flows radially into the conductors and accounts for energy lost to resistive heating of the conductor. No energy flows outside the cable, either, since there the magnetic fields of inner and outer conductors cancel to zero.

Electrical energy delivered to the load is flowing entirely through the dielectric between the conductors. Very little energy flows in the conductors themselves, since the electric field strength is nearly zero.

Cable Break-in


There are many factors that make cable break-in necessary and many reasons why the results vary. If you measure a new cable with a voltmeter you will see a standing voltage because good dielectrics make poor conductors. They hold a charge much like a rubbed cat’s fur on a dry day. It takes a while for this charge to equalize in the cable. Better cables often take longer to break-in. The best "air dielectric" techniques, such as PFA tube construction, have large non-conductive surfaces to hold charge, much like the cat on a dry day.


Cables that do not have time to settle, such as musical instrument and microphone cables, often use conductive dielectrics like rubber or carbonized cotton to get around the problem. This dramatically reduces microphonics and settling time, but the other dielectric characteristics of these insulators are poor and they do not qualify sonically for high-end cables. Developing non-destructive techniques for reducing and equalizing the charge in excellent dielectric is a challenge in high end cables.

The high input impedance necessary in audio equipment makes uneven dielectric charge a factor. One reason settling time takes so long is we are linking the charge with mechanical stress/strain relationships. The physical make up of a cable is changed slightly by the charge and visa versa. It is like electrically charging the cat. The physical make up of the cat is changed by the charge. It is "frizzed" and the charge makes it's hair stand on end. "PFA Cats", cables and their dielectric, take longer to loose this charge and reach physical homeostasis.


The better the dielectric's insulation, the longer it takes to settle. A charge can come from simply moving the cable (Piezoelectric effect and simple friction), high voltage testing during manufacture, etc. Cable that has a standing charge is measurably more microphonic and an uneven distribution of the charge causes something akin to structural return loss in a rising impedance system. When I took steps to eliminate these problems, break-in time was reduced and the cable sounded generally better. I know Bill Low at Audioquest has also taken steps to minimize this problem.


Mechanical stress is the root of a lot of the break-in phenomenon and it is not just a factor with cables. As a rule, companies set up audition rooms at high end audio shows a couple of days ahead of time to let them break in. The first day the sound is usually bad and it is very stressful. The last day sounds great. Mechanical stress in speaker cables, speaker cabinets, even the walls of the room, must be relaxed in order for the system to sound its best. This is the same phenomenon we experience in musical instruments. They sound much better after they have been played. Many musicians leave their instruments in front of a stereo that is playing to get them to warm up. This is very effective with a new guitar. Pianos are a stress and strain nightmare. Any change, even in temperature or humidity, will degrade their sound. A precisely tuned stereo system is similar.


You never really get all the way there, you sort of keep halving the distance to zero. Some charge is always retained. It is generally in the MV range in a well settled cable. Triboelectric noise in a cable is a function of stress and retained charge, which a good cable will release with both time and use. How much time and use is dependent on the design of the cable, materials used, treatment of the conductors during manufacture, etc.


There are many small tricks and ways of dealing with the problem. Years ago, I began using PFA tube "air dielectric" construction and the charge on the surface of the tubes became a real issue. I developed a fluid that adds a very slight conductivity to the surface of the dielectric. Treated cables actually have a better measured dissipation factor and the sound of the cables improved substantially. It had been observed in mid eighties that many cables could be improved by wiping them with a anti-static cloth. Getting something to stick to PFA was the real challenge. We now use an anti-static fluid in all our cables and anti-static additives in the final jacketing material. This attention to charge has reduced break-in time and in general made the cable sound substantially better. This is due to the reduction of overall charge in the cable and the equalization of the distributed charge on the surface of conductor jacket.


It seems there are many infinitesimal factors that add up. Overtime you find one leads down a path to another. In short, if a dielectric surface in a cable has a high or uneven charge which dissipates with time or use, triboelectric and other noise in the cable will also reduce with time and use. This is the essence of break-in

A note of caution. Moving a cable will, to some degree, traumatize it. The amount of disturbance is relative to the materials used, the cable's design and the amount of disturbance. Keeping a very low level signal in the cable at all times helps. At a show, where time is short, you never turn the system off. I also believe the use of degaussing sweeps, such as on the Cardas Frequency Sweep and Burn-In Record (side 1, cut 2a) helps.


A small amount of energy is retained in the stored mechanical stress of the cable. As the cable relaxes, a certain amount of the charge is released, like in an electroscope. This is the electromechanical connection.


Many factors relating to a cable's break-in are found in the sonic character or signature of a cable. If we look closely at dielectrics we find a similar situation. The dielectric actually changes slightly as it charges and its dissipation factor is linked to its hardness. In part these changes are evidenced in the standing charge of the cable. A new cable, out of the bag, will have a standing charge when uncoiled. It can have as much as several hundred millivolts. If the cable is left at rest it will soon drop to under one hundred, but it will takes days of use in the system to fall to the teens and it never quite reaches zero. These standing charges appear particularly significant in low level interconnects to preamps with high impedance inputs.


The interaction of mechanical and electrical stress/strain variables in a cable are integral with the break-in, as well as the resonance of the cable. Many of the variables are lumped into a general category called triboelectric noise. Noise is generated in a cable as a function of the variations between the components of the cable. If a cable is flexed, moved, charged, or changed in any way, it will be a while before it is relaxed again. The symmetry of the cable's construction is a big factor here. Very careful design and execution by the manufacturer helps a lot. Very straight forward designs can be greatly improved with the careful choice of materials and symmetrical construction. Audioquest has built a large and successful high-end cable company around these principals.


The basic rules for the interaction of mechanical and electrical stress/strain variables holds true, regardless of scale or medium. Cables, cats, pianos and rooms all need to relax in order to be at their best. Constant attention to physical and environmental conditions, frequent use and the degaussing of a system help it achieve and maintain a relaxed state.
Insights - Cable Break-in

terry9497 posts08-18-2017 11:31am@jea48

Yes also to IC's.

Further to the above, I forgot that about 20 years ago, when I saw IC costs going stratospheric, I decided to do an experiment.

I built a cabinet for ARC SP10 pre-amp and Nakamichi CR7, which was a Faraday cage. I then noted that, at line levels, capacitance was the enemy, not inductance, so I found some very pure 4 nines silver 24 AWG and had it gold plated.

I drilled holes in the bulkhead between the ARC and the Nak which were 2" apart and threaded bare wires through them, and then protected the wires with 0.375 teflon tubing, which touched the wires scarcely at all. Thus, compared to conventional co-ax of whatever manufacture, dielectric absorption was near zero, as was capacitance. Cables were 26 inches and terminated with ETI RCA's.

I was then in a position to conduct a single-blind experiment of theoretically optimal cables compared to Canare Starquad. An expert test subject (my long suffering wife) was unable to detect the difference reliably. Of less interest, because I was not a blind subject, I was also unable to hear the difference.

This is NOT definitive because the subject was not required to make many, many repeated observations for statistical analysis. But the point was clear: there ARE things that yield readily detectable differences, like turntables, tonearms, cartridges, SUT's, tubes, pre-amp topology, power supplies, capacitors, resistors, amplifier topology, and speakers.

So the latter is where I spend my money.

sean
6,229                                                                      posts10-09-2006 11:49am


I stumbled across a very curious phenomena pertaining to cable dielectric at work the other day. Nobody that i have discussed the matter with can explain what is happening, yet they have seen the very easily measured and duplicated results that i’m obtaining and can’t deny them.

I have ideas as to what is causing this curious phenomena, but don’t want to speak up about this as of yet. I will say that what i’m seeing tends to make me believe that dielectrics, which aren’t supposed to conduct, have a polarity / directionality to them i.e. they conduct better in one direction than in another.

I know that some companies already have cabling on the market that supposedly deals with this subject, but i don’t think that they fully understand exactly what is going on here. I just hope that Clark Johnsen doesn’t see this. Something about polarity based issues tends to get him in all worked up : ) Sean

I will say that what i’m seeing tends to make me believe that dielectrics, which aren’t supposed to conduct, have a polarity / directionality to them i.e. they conduct better in one direction than in another.

terry9
498 posts                                                                           08-18-2017 4:03pm

@jea48

Solid. They came off the spool and went to the plating company. No, I did not reverse them. I did not then, nor do I now, expect there to be a perceptible difference.
I no longer spend much time on interconnects, for the reasons stated.

Re: maybe rcrump... I don’t know, but... rcrump 06:45:41 09/30/00 (11)

In Reply to: Re: maybe rcrump... I don’t know, but... posted by Greg R. on September 29, 2000 at 19:47:48:

Solid core wire is extremely directional so just mark the end with some masking tape as it comes off the spool. Orient the wires so you have piece of masking tape at either end and terminate the wires. Throw it on a MOBIE or whatever overnight and then listen to it noting which way gives the highest image height. This is the correct orientation.

If you run the signal and return wires in the same direction you will end up with hot spots in the stage, normally at or close to the speakers, low image height and have a gaping hole in the middle of the stage...Keep in mind I am referring to the sound of the stage (reflections) not the individual instruments spread across the stage....Interconnects or speaker wires that have pianos wandering all over the stage normally have their signal and return going in the same direction....

If you run the signal and return wires in the same direction you will end up with hot spots in the stage, normally at or close to the speakers, low image height and have a gaping hole in the middle of the stage...Keep in mind I am referring to the sound of the stage (reflections) not the individual instruments spread across the stage....

almarg
7,421 posts                                                                      08-18-2017 6:10pm

Quoted from AA:
If you run the signal and return wires in the same direction you will end up with hot spots in the stage, normally at or close to the speakers, low image height and have a gaping hole in the middle of the stage...Keep in mind I am referring to the sound of the stage (reflections) not the individual instruments spread across the stage....Interconnects or speaker wires that have pianos wandering all over the stage normally have their signal and return going in the same direction....

On the other hand, though, if the signal and return wires are run in opposite directions (relative to what came off of the spool), then if the cable is constructed in a symmetrical manner (i.e., both conductors identical, and not having a shield grounded at just one end), then reversing the direction of the cable should make no difference **even if** the conductors are intrinsically directional. Unless, that is, the dielectric (as opposed to the conductors) somehow causes a difference.

If the two conductors in a symmetrically designed cable are run in opposite directions (relative to what came off of the spool), then no matter which way the cable is connected the two conductors will **both** always be in the allegedly "correct" direction for half of each cycle, and the allegedly "incorrect" direction for the other half of each cycle. That follows from what I said in an earlier post in this thread:

Almarg 8-14-2017
When "the current" is traveling away from the component in one of the two conductors it is traveling toward the component in the other of the two conductors.

And it is **always** traveling through the input circuit of the component in one direction or the other, aside from the brief instant during each cycle at which the applied voltage crosses zero, and the direction changes.

(To add context, I had put quotation marks around "the current" to distinguish it from the electromagnetic energy of "the signal," that being conducted via the dielectric).

So the AA member’s statement seems to me to be self-contradictory. He’s saying that wires are directional, but putting the two wires in directions that would allow the cable to exhibit their alleged directionality will produce bad results.

Best regards,
-- Al

On the other hand, though, if the signal and return wires are run in opposite directions (relative to what came off of the spool), then if the cable is constructed in a symmetrical manner (i.e., both conductors identical, and not having a shield grounded at just one end), then reversing the direction of the cable should make no difference **even if** the conductors are intrinsically directional. Unless, that is, the dielectric (as opposed to the conductors) somehow causes a difference.

Re: maybe rcrump... I don’t know, but... rcrump 08:15:38 10/01/00 (0)

In Reply to: Re: maybe rcrump... I don’t know, but... posted by surround on September 30, 2000 at 20:41:31:

Glad I could help! I think once that there are definitive FM measurements available on wire that this swapping ends will become clear, but in the meantime building wire is an artform once you get beyond the simple measurements such as inductance, capacitance and resistance....Jon Risch posted a bibliography recently and I noticed that some folks are doing some FM measurements trying to get a handle on some of the effects that are easily heard in a good system....My partner, John Curl, has a wonderful bench and can measure down to one part in a million as respects AM measurements, but it is obvious that we are measuring the wrong things as respects wire. These are exciting times and the music will be better served once we can measure these effects that are so easily heard.....In the meantime enjoy your project and note that some of the cost of the commercial interconnects went into a lot of time spent listening to different permutations...

almarg
7,423 posts                                                                         08-18-2017 7:59pm

As for the "why" of whatever intrinsic directionality wire may possess, I note that even he says "I don’t want to speculate why wire is directional." Although he also says that "it appears to be an FM distortion." FM distortion, phase distortion, and timing jitter are inter-related concepts. And as you alluded to, and I indicated earlier in the thread, timing jitter resulting from VSWR (reflection) effects figures to be the basis of directionality in digital cables. But I have no idea how at analog audio frequencies a symmetrically designed cable might introduce differing amounts of FM or phase distortion depending on which way it is connected.

Yes, I see that now, Jim. He does not say, at least in that thread, that cables are directional; he is just addressing the wire itself. Yet it is also true, as we are saying, that the cable configuration he recommends would negate the intrinsic directionality he is attributing to the wire itself.

Yet it is also true, as we are saying, that the cable configuration he recommends would negate the intrinsic directionality he is attributing to the wire itself.

Obviously Bob thinks wire per se is very directional. He actually said extremely directional. The only question is if he’s right the way he places the directional wires in the cable - one wire in one direction and the other wire in the opposite direction. Why would he *intentionally* construct a cable to be non-optimal knowing wire is very directional? He wouldn’t.

Re: maybe rcrump... I don't know, but... Greg R. 09:52:26 09/30/00 (2)

In Reply to: Re: maybe rcrump... I don't know, but... posted by rcrump on September 30, 2000 at 06:45:41:

Thanks, I agree with your view on this.
I just reversed the ICs and the image height did seem a bit lower. Most everything else also sounded worse, and it seems like I had lost some smoothness and the overnight break-in period.
This may have been due to:
#1)the wire direction makes a difference, or
#2)the way the cable was broken in overnight in one direction.
I think both #1 and #2.
I don't know exactly why they sound a tiny bit better in one direction, but one thing I do know for sure. I am very thankful for all the good advise, as these IC's sound very clean and vivid, with a dynamic smooth sound. I feel alot closer to the music. One of the things I like the most is the way drum whacks and rim shots are propelled at me. It's so unrestrained and vivid, it actually makes me blink, or cringe! Not bad for $30 IC's! I would recommend people to pause and think about this, before laying down some big bucks for some factory made IC's.
I'm already looking forward to my next project, the "Bus Mechanic" speaker wire. ;~) Best Wishes, Greg R.

As I’ve stated previously, both wires should actualy be in the same direction, not opposite directions.

If you run the signal and return wires in the same direction you will end up with hot spots in the stage, normally at or close to the speakers, low image height and have a gaping hole in the middle of the stage...Keep in mind I am referring to the sound of the stage (reflections) not the individual instruments spread across the stage....Interconnects or speaker wires that have pianos wandering all over the stage normally have their signal and return going in the same direction....

Re: Is stranded core directional also? rcrump 03:59:51 10/02/00 (2)

In Reply to: Re: Is stranded core directional also? posted by steve b on October 01, 2000 at 18:05:36:

Steve, I don't want to speculate why wire is directional, but it is as poor Greg has found in a later post....I spent about three months playing with such things before I released my commercial interconnects and speaker wire and went about as crazy as Greg is going right now and can't tell you how much wire I trashed as I forgot to mark it with some masking take as I took it off the spool....Directionality in wire will be measured some day as it appears to be an FM distortion and wandering pianos (small phase changes with frequency) will be a thing of the past. Until then use your ears to discern directionality of wire. Stranded wire likely suffers from a lack of focus compared to solid core as some of the strands go one way and some the other, but this is pure speculation on my part.....Just enjoy the ride!

While mylars are fairly efficient from a size and cost point of view, we realized they have problems with dielectric absorption. I didn’t believe it at first. I was working with Noel Lee and a company called Symmetry. We designed this crossover and I specified these one microfarad Mylar caps. Noel kept saying he could 'hear the caps' and I thought he was crazy. Its performance was better than aluminum or tantalum electrolytics, and I couldn’t measure anything wrong with my Sound Technology distortion analyzer. So what was I to complain about? Finally I stopped measuring and started listening, and I realized that the capacitor did have a fundamental flaw. This is were the ear has it all over test equipment. The test equipment is almost always brought on line to actually measure problems the ear hears. So we’re always working in reverse. If we do hear something and we can’t measure it then we try to find ways to measure what we hear. In the end we invariably find a measurement that matches what the ear hears and it becomes very obvious to everybody.

Years ago, there was a time when people used to think you could have a two- or four-foot path difference between loudspeaker components; like the Klipschorn, for example. Everyone said this time difference was inaudible, and it didn’t really matter because Bell Labs' research, Ohm’s law of acoustics, Helmholtz and all these other people believed that the ear was completely insensitive to phase. So it didn’t matter how you built the speaker as long as it sort of averaged out sort of okay in the room. You could take five microphones and measure them all together, if that measured out okay within a few DB’s then heck with it. Well, that really isn’t true and of course when stereo came along all of a sudden you had these big Klipschorns and they wouldn’t image for anything. At least that was my personal experience. I owned them and I was a believer too. Then I started measuring them and I said 'oh my goodness, this is a  problem.' The late Richard Heyser tried to tell people that a two foot path difference might be audible. People were going crazy and saying this was impossible and it was a big controversy. Now, of course, no fool would design a speaker with a two- or four-foot path difference. John Dunlavy was very outspoken on the Internet this week, criticizing a loudspeaker that wasn’t completely phase aligned to within one inch. See how we change. I don’t disagree with John Dunlavy, although I do think he is overstating his case in this particular one. But, there was a time when we didn’t. The same thing happens with capacitors. There was a time when we didn’t know better and we just used any old capacitor as long as it had the right values.

Jea48 8-19-2017
Al,
Question.
Does the hot/signal conductor, of an IC, hold any more importance carrying the audio signal from the source to the load than the ground/return conductor?
If yes please explain.
If not please explain.