Spades vs. Banana plugs ??

Whoever said to use bare wire with the ends tinned together is one of the first methods  I used.  That said, four plus decades later I've tried everything from inexpensive solid copper nickel plated spades purchased at the hardware store to WBT expanding bananas.  My preferred lately but not married to them are a solid copper banana designed like the nickel bananas preferred by Linn, Naim and many British companies.  Can I hear a difference between any of them?  Not really.  I even experimented with different bananas with screw down connections to the wire on Tara Labs cable from three bucks a piece to Fifty dollars.  The Monoprice  Affinity Series 24k Gold Speaker Banana Plugs that Brent Butterworth recommends I think are a best buy.

Wireworld’s BFA bananas are my favorite termination of all time. They are low-mass (which for some reason consistently sounds better), have great spring retention and fit snugly in any binding post. I am not a fan of most Wireworld products but I do love the performance of their factory-terminated speaker cables. 
 

If one must use spades, the Kimber Postmaster spades are probably the best option available. 

@mitch2   a group of audiophiles (known for believing something as small as a power line fuse makes a large sonic difference) choose utility over conductivity

Just how conductive is a loose silver connection? Or a corroded copper connection? You should see a stranded copper cable which is mostly terminated by copper sulphate.

@terry9 - The observation was not about allowing your connections to become corroded, which is never a good thing, but rather the irony that a group who mostly believe that every small detail can significantly impact the sound of a system would select less conductive connectors because they were easier to use, a generalization of course.  However, another example would be audiophiles who would never dream of using typical OFC (at about 101% IACS) copper cables instead of cables made from OCC copper (at about 103% IACS).  Would they use connectors made from an alloy that is only 40-60% as conductive as copper?

However, as @mammothguy54 pointed out, some are likely using all copper bananas, which are less common but available at a higher price.

bfa bannanas for me spades tend to work their way loose over time

@mitch2   I see that I misunderstood your post. I thought you were choosing theory over practicality - and a loose spade connector may not be detected as it gradually looses conductivity, leading to poorer sound over time.

Spades are a bolted joint.  Bolted joints are used a lot in a lot of places.  The one time they have a vulnerability is the configuration like a spade connector.  Generally they have a washer under them that doesn't stick out.  But a spade sticks out.  So long as the spade/wire isn't touched or pulled, all is well, but if the entnding lever is bumped or pulled, it will loosen the connection.

So I'm sure some people have great luck with them, as their connections live a quiet life.  Others, not so much.  

Just wanting to point out why we have different reports of experinces.

Jerry

Not my experience at all. My high end connectors on Scanspeak drivers and Bryston amplifiers all come loose with spades or bare wire, on their own, without mortal assistance. Poltergeist?

Of course, when loosing is a serious problem, lock washers are invariably used.

On the amp end I have ended up with bananas and spades, because I regularly swap amps and have to. These are gold plated copper bases with threaded ends so that I can easily change between banana and spade tips. I feel a bit safer when using the bananas (for reasons well covered already).

At the speaker end I use solid copper bananas. I made them up with twin screw ones, but threw one screw away and filed that hole with solder. My understanding is that keeping air away from copper connections (or silver) with solder, gold, or rhodium reduces oxidation/tarnishing.

However, I have never tried to hear the difference between plugs or bare wires in a system where all else is equal, so the above is only based on reading, not listening.

Bare wire at the amp end; I test the compression regularly. Bananas at the speaker end, strictly for convenience as I swap speakers, and I don't have much faith in switchers.

My tarantulas prefer bananas

I just recently switched speaker cables and started using Audio Art’s top of the line. Of all the bells and whistles, they have locking banana plugs.  So far, I’m thinking this is the way to go.

Deltron style banana plugs have the tightest fit and most intimate contact with the jack IME, w/o going to a locking banana.

I prefer bananas, but never feel like they make the connection that spades do For the same reasons like others have stated. I only buy used equipment so when I got my transparent cable, most of what I found were spade to spade  My older Wilson speakers do not accept bananas either  To the point that others have made about shorting out your amp, I always get super nervous connecting my speaker cables and never do it with the amp on  It seems that Cardas is the gold standard for terminals. I wonder why they make them positioned so close together. Why not have the physical apparatus 2 inches wide with more than enough space for either spade to do a complete rotation without risk of making contact?  
 

I've made several sets of speaker cables using crimp on connectors from Analysis Plus.  I put spades on the speaker end because I don't want the weight of the cables pulling down on banana plugs. Plus spades are more secure if you occasionally move your speakers around seeking the perfect spot or just to vacuum underneath.  I put bananas on the amp end because the connectors are usually an inch or two above shelf with minimal strain on the plug.  Also, the connectors on the rear of some amps can be quite cluttered making bananas the easy choice.  I use a ratcheting crimper which produces a proper secure crimp every time.

The ubiquitous five-way binding posts are hard pressed to cope with the mechanical stress imposed by the massive cables folks use. 12AWG is about as far as five-way will comfortably handle.

Speakon connectors address five-way's shortcomings but are still largely absent from the audiophile world. There are signs this is changing though, for instance Linkwitz uses Speakons in their LX521 flagships. Benchmark does too.

If Furutech, WBT et al start making $500 Speakon connectors, they may yet become the audiophile standard.

If Furutech, WBT et al start making $500 Speakon connectors, they may yet become the audiophile standard.

Are you in marketing?  What a great idea!  Create a new "audiophile standard" that almost nobody currently uses so that almost everybody would have to purchase the new standard to avoid audiophile FOMO!

Since I have used spades without fail for the past 40 years, this is like so many other audiophile products in that it sort of solves a problem not in evidence (IMO), even though I would not argue that Speakon connectors are better.  Of course, the ring connector idea also solves the same problem but the binding post and connector people have never collaborated on a consistent/universal size for the hole and the post.  A simple screw post and nut holding a ring connector and we would have never needed fancy spring loaded bananas or multiple types and sizes of spades.

Good quality spades for best sound. 
 

Bananas for convenience but poor sound. 
 

The tight screw down compression of a spade is always better than loose banana slip in connection. 
 

Just don’t be a dummy and let the spades short/touch. 

@sudnh 

So you learned this by experimentation? Please tell us the details.
 

I have always thought that spades should sound the best… but after hundreds of hours of experimenting with interconnects, and a hundred hours with speaker cables etc. it has just been easier to choose spades on the logic and not actually do the work comparing them. I’d love to hear the details.

@ghdprentice

I’ve done many years of DIY using high end cables and connectors and had spades and bananas. Left bananas connectors long ago due to poorer sound quality.

Bananas, particularly the ones that spin are, for sound quality, not great and the connection degrades faster over time due to the low compression slip in fit.

Perfectly fine for mid fi audio tho where uncompromised SQ is not a goal  

Bananas,  My Naim Supernait 3 only except Bananas.  

N

My Furetech spades haven't ever came  loose on wbt binding post although I broke one wbt post over tightening it. The trick is to get its tightness just right. You have to turn the spade along with the post.  Also I installed the wbt's myself farther apart than most speakers would come from the factory leaving plenty of room for them not to spin around and touch.  Next time I might go with bananas though 

Anyone know if they make a speaker cable that's terminated with a combination of both spade and banana connectors?

Double the surface contact, best of both worlds!

For what it’s worth, coming from Monoprice 12g wire with Nakamichi bananas, I went with the Viborg pure copper banana plugs on Furutech FS-A36 12g speaker cable. I tried one speaker with the Nakamichi & the other with the Viborg both treated with Stabilant & the Viborg & the OCC Copper made a HUGE difference. And I thought my system sounded good before the change. Also when I did the UPGRADE, I tried the Viborg pure silver & lost the ''3D/openness'' of the pure copper. 

@thecarpathian Brilliant idea. It would be easy to implement  using a double double bi- wire design and blow peoples minds. 

+1 bare wire.

Answered definitively in a prior thread that bananas are the only sensible choice. 

All meant in good fun though.

@oldaudiophile @davetheoilguy P.S. Re bare wire and gauge, I use ~AWG 4-5 (so VERY thick) bare wires. Took a bit of fiddling to get them in neat, but works fine both amp (Pass XA25) and speaker (PearlAcoustics Sibelius) side. And no, they don't get loose. I have not done a pull up on them, but no unreasonable amount of pulling will move them.

In my experience mixing metals and introducing additional metal mass are both detrimental to speaker connections. Bare wires are best followed by minimum weight pure copper spades lest you use silver wires