Official Luthiers Forum!

i know all about conductivity but would silver wiring in a guitar actually work? i found some wire insulators and silver wire on the internet and was curious if it would change the sound or performance at all

The only way anyone would know for sure would be if they rewired an existing guitar using silver wiring. Beyond doing that, it's all theoretical conjecture.
Why don't you try it and tell us!
Has anyone done that?

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Old growth, shmold growth!

i guess ill do it on my build, but the question is-

pure silver or tarnish resistant silver?

now i have the idea to wire a pickup with one of them too...

Pure silver doesn't tarnish the way sterling silver does. When you say tarnish resistant, do you mean the silver wire is laquered?
BTW can you post a link to where the silver wire is? I'm intrigued...

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Old growth, shmold growth!

sterling: http://www.wire-sculpture.com/sterling- ... 3-727.html
Argentium Silver: http://www.wire-sculpture.com/argentium ... 6-724.html

idk anything about argentium..


cheap!

the wiring insulator: http://www.buyheatshrink.com/heatshrink ... efin.htm#B


On a side note i came up with a cool idea for a pickup winder...

all i did was google for the wire. they also sell gold too if you click on "wire" at the top

Thanx for the link!

np, but that gauge is for single wires. search for 26 and 28 gauged silver wire, 28 is more common with 4 conductors

If you're using it for its superior conductivity, then purer is better but you're still looking at a high percentage of silver with sterling or Argentium.

Will it make an audible difference? Doubt it.

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Bob Garrish
Former Canonized Purveyor of Fine CNC Luthier Services

Just wander over to where the audiophile guys hang out on the 'net and you will find out more than you want to know about silver wire.
Or if you have a hankering for a $2000 wire for attaching the speaker to your amp....
http://www.audionote.co.uk/comp/cables.shtml

Might want to consider a new output transformer (wound with silver wire) for your tube amp while you are at it....
http://www.audionote.co.uk/comp/trans/trans_02_output.shtml

I'm sure you will hear the difference. After all, if you spent all that money and couldn't hear any difference, you'd feel kinda foolish........

Cheers
John

I use a stranded ,silver plated,teflon jacket wire from Alpha and it is very good, it tins very well and has a heat resistant jacket. This is a big upgrade from the usual guitar wiring. Honestly the lengths should be so short that providing you make a good solder joint you may not hear any difference with pure silver. Some theories say that the electrons travel on the surface of a strand of wire, so solid may be a big overkill.

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How long is that in luthyears?

could i get a link where you got your wire?

I just called up Radar electronic supply in Seattle and asked for Alpha 5855 22AWG and specified the colors needed.
Sorry, no internet was used.

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How long is that in luthyears?

Why would you think silver wire would make a difference that would matter?

John

higher conductivity and magnetivity

Are you talking about re-wrapping a pickup with silver wire or just connecting the pickups to other components with silver wire?

Both, in theory it would work better

It's pretty easy to show that in theory any difference in wire type to connect
the components won't make any difference.

The variability of pickups and pots swamps any difference in resistance you'll
get with silver vs copper. Which is only about a 5% difference.

22 AWG wire has a resistance of .016 ohms/foot

The pickup has a resistance of 6K to 10K for "normal" pickups.

Then there's the volume pot with 5% or so tollerance. 250K ohms - 500K ohms.

The wire connecting these parts doesn't have much effect on anything.

A simple experiment to try would be to use two wires to connect all the components,
that would cut the resistance in half. See if you can hear the difference.

These are the kinds of things you should think about.

As for the pickup. Well, pickups are complicated so it's harder to say.

Exactly what wire were you thinking of using to wrap a pickup with? Can you post a pointer/

John

I would be most interested to hear, of some one who had wound a pick up, with silver-it would need to be coated, as is copper winding wire- . The pickup is where the subtlety can make a big difference. And in the pickup we are talking about thousands of feet of wire inside a magnetic field.
If that doesn't do it try platinum and palladium.

One possible advantage there could be to silver is you may be able to use a thinner wire/ same number of turns and get an equal out put/ohms etc. This could give you a lighter instrument, or simply a smaller sized coil which could impact sound characteristics

The problem is how to find 42 or 43 gauge silver wire! I don't know what to use to thin it out too... But the theory is that a upgrade on to a better conductor and magnetic source that the quality would be better

Wack wack wack.