Effects of brading interconnect wire

No, probably positive. A few companies do this as their design, such as Jena Labs. If you get the postive and negative wires to cross at 90 degrees you get a phase cancellation--although very small for this signal, it probably is perceivable in high-end systems. Having not done a comparison myself I can't say for sure, but I can say that it won't hurt. If you kept your wife happy, and you didn't do harm to the signal--you're ahead of the game.

You say that the wires are a "tri-wire" configuration? Well then, since all the wires carry the same signal there is no interaction at all.

There was a related thread on this a short while back, check this out: http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?cspkr&1066229292&read&keyw&zzvandersteen It relates Richard Vandersteen's thoughts on bi-wiring which would also apply to tri-wiring.

The orientation of the wires in a speaker cable is one of the biggest factors that determines the "sound" of that cable, so it is logical to conclude that braiding the cables will affect the sound.

The alternating currents that flow through speaker wires create moving magnetic fields. These fields cut through nearby conductors and induce currents in them, the transformer effect. The amount of current induced is proportional to the amount of current inducing it and the proximity and orientation of the wires. So it doesn't really matter if they carry the same signal, the wires will interact and this interaction will be affected by braiding them. In addition, the capacitance and inductance of the cables will be changed.

Also, tri-wire cables do not all carry the same signal. Some drivers draw more current than others so the magnetic fields developed around these cables would be greater than those that carry less current.

Whether all of this will be audible in your system is impossible to predict.

Thanks for the input folks, It has made for some interesting reading. I have seen much on the topic dealing w/ interconnects and mains cables, but not much on speaker wire. I realize that when tri wiring (i'm using the same 12ga wire for LF MF and HF) each driver section places different demands on the wire and creates different "pollution". I'm going to check out that link from the archives tonight.