Can you use leftover house wiring for speakers

rogerd

Hi-Just wondering if your common household wiring would work well for speakers. I'm moving our master bedroom downstairs and have the chance to build a small theater room 14’x16'x9’high. So I'm already thinking about how to use some left over wiring from the last Reno, this is your standard house hold wiring white sheathing with 3 wires, it is certainly heavy gauge have anyone used this before or should I stick with speaker wire?

ben62670

What is the rest of your system? Is music a high priority?

rogerd

Hi- I have a H/K 2600, Tsi 500, Tsi 300 surrounds, Kef sub, and Klipsch read surrounds. As for music I'm into buying just about anything on Blue Ray, so yes it is priority.

ben62670

Is the wire going to be in wall? IF it is use the CL2 14/2 wire here.
http://www.monoprice.com/products/subdepartment.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10239
Is the receiver going to be in between the speakers?
How long are all the individual cable runs going to be?

rogerd

That right I'm going to re-wire the whole system longest runs around 35 plus feet. I have Home Depo 16G wiring right now and I was thinking of useing the left over reno stuff but looking at your link and online since I made this post and if I read between the lines right I should go with the right gear and stop being so bleeping cheap.

ben62670

That Home Depot wire is real crappy. It turns green with oxidazation in a short amount of time. 14ga is fine for those runs. Are they going to be inwall, or run on the floor?

rogerd

Walls and ceiling. I going to use wall plates as well and plug the speakers in with banana plugs what do you think? I have to go the wife beckens thanks for any input.

Cheers R

ben62670

The CL2 wire I linked to above will be fine.

rogerd

Morning, so I checked out Monoprice great prices thanks so much for posting that link, also order some 12 AWG to re-wire everything outside the walls. And banana plugs on sale for a $1.53 a pair. You know up north I paid $16.00 a pair for RC plugs and that was cheap up here, At BB and Future Shop they can go for $24.00 to $30.00 for two pairs so I was picking up a set at a time so the wife wouldn’t blow a gasket and now I ordered enough to complete my whole system for less than $30.00 that includes shipping.

leftwinger57

sounds like your talking about Romex type of interior high voltage wire. It is not a good choice for stereos being that it has no flexibility at all and it's solid wire. YES it could be the same gauge as reg speaker wire usually 14 ga.The third wire your speaking of is for the ground connection.i would use dedicted speaker wire lowest gauge you could afford non higher than 16.

inspiredsports

Can you use it; Yes.

There's also an argument that coat hanger wire of the proper gauge is OK too.

But there is a whole wonderful speaker wire industry out there, and lots of nice economical cable that will serve you better. If on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the best, and you rate sound quality at least a 3 or higher, my vote is that you use something better than Romex.

djperez81

Gotta love monoprice i just bought 100ft 12ga, banana clips, premium interconnects, premium sub cable and a few other things and only dropped 65 bucks. If your on a budget like me and want some decent wires, etc monoprice is the way to go.

Tony M

djperez81 wrote: »

Gotta love monoprice i just bought 100ft 12ga, banana clips, premium interconnects, premium sub cable and a few other things and only dropped 65 bucks. If your on a budget like me and want some decent wires, etc monoprice is the way to go.

Good job.

I ordered a few spools over that past two years from them.

When I sold speakers, people would ask."got any spare wire?" yup sure do.Thanks for buys my speakers, here you go, what leagnths do you need. I gave most of it away. I like giving extra stuff when people buy from me and I know I made a good margin of profit.

Flip8812

While you could use Romex as was pointed out it is solid.
Not saying I know it all I think you will find it difficult to work with as a speaker wire and may run the risk of breaking you connection point to the gear if not careful when moving the speakers or gear for mounting. If the speakers are in wall if you have the room I would use banana plugs to lower the risk of damage (and I dont like banaba plugs most of the time).

I am sure someone could make the argument Stranded is the way to go due to the way the 'signal' rides on the conductors so high count stranded is the way to go. Myself I can not hear a differnce in stranded vs. solid. O2 free may help the over a long time period but as far as listning quality again I hear no difference. Check out Skywalker the usually have some pretty good wire prices. With needing a very little amount it may be cheaper to post in WTB area or call some CI's in your area.