Re: OK to use TV coax for microphone?

On Sun, 04 May 2008 12:51:35 +0100, Chris S <default@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
wrote:

>On Sun 04 May 2008 02:23:08, Michael A. Terrell wrote:
>
>> 
>> Walt Davidson wrote:
>>> 
>>> On Sat, 03 May 2008 11:05:41 -0700, Kevin McMurtrie
>>> <mcmurtri@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>> 
>>> >TV coax is very brittle.  The inner wire is copper-plated steel
>>> >and the outer ****eld is aluminum wire and aluminum foil.  It
>>> >will quickly crack where it meets the connectors.
>>> 
>>> What planet do you live on?  I have never seen TV coax as you
>>> describe.  Coax with copper-plated steel inner conductor is
>>> mostly used as data cable (ethernet).
>> 
>> 
>> Then you've never seen the wire used by cable TV and Satellite TV 
>> companies. Pure copper is too expensive these days, and too soft
>> for repeated flexing.  If you want to pay over a dollar a foot for
>> copper core TV coax, go ahead. The last time I had to buy some it
>> was about eight times the price of the foil ****eld W/braid TV
>> coax, and useless for UHF.  Use a magnet, and see for yourself.
>> The copper plating smears when cut with dykes, and makes the
>> coated steel appear to be solid copper.
>> 
>
>If copper is soft then wouldn't that make it good for repeated 
>flexing in the sense that copper isn't so stiff that it wouldn't 
>split or crack?

If it is a cable that needs to be moved around and flexed, then it
absolutely has to be stranded. Solid core will always fatigue and
break in those circumstances.

d

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