Is there a difference when splicing for your speakers?

Question

My speaker wire is too short, if I splice will I notice a difference in sound quality?

Also what if I triple splice for example, if I splice the same wire 3 times using 3 different cords?

Is the sound quality reduced or does it stay the same?

Please no yes or no answers thanks -hopefully you can give me a detailed explanation thank you ;)

Answer 1

forget that mess ,,. then what happens if you cross wire neg/to poss. some real nice heavy lamp cord , will make life easier. and sound better to boot /

Answer 2

Are you talking about reducing the size (i.e. diameter) of the cable?  If this is the case, yes, it will make a difference or at least make it harder for the amplifier to drive your speakers.  The longer the length, the more affect there will be by reducing the gauge of the speaker wire.

You are best off just purchasing the desired length in 16 ga. or larger for runs up to 30 feet.  If price is the deciding factor, you can go real cheap and still get a large gauge wire by going down to your local hardware store (e.g. home depot or ace) and get a long power cord and trim (i.e. splice) the ends on each side, match the polarities -and voilá!

Answer 3

Signals start at the source and flow through your system to the speakers. Every step along the way where this signal goes from one piece of equipment to the next is an opportunity to lose out on quality- the speaker cables are one of those steps, and a pretty important one.

Gage differences, impedance changes at the splice,  and

dielectric differences in the insulation on the wire can all reduce sound quality at the speaker. A short at a badly insulated splice can also fry your amp in a heartbeat. There's a reason that people who buy expensive gear also buy good speaker cables and interconnects- you can hear the difference. If your gear is really weak, you may not notice if you run old green crusty wire- but if you have anything decent at the far end, you're gonna be disappointed.

Answer 4

Unless you are using high end gear, you will not notice a difference in sound quality from properly spliced speaker wire.