Banana Plugs

[Pghpooh]

I use 12 gauge audio wire for my speakers. It is a Radio Shack brand flat wire.
My receiver is a Onkyo putting out 100 watts per channel. My Speakers are Ohm Micro Walsh Talls.
My problem is minor and looking for some thoughts and opinions.
The 12 gauge wire seems to be too thick when I try to attach it to the binding posts on the receiver.
The binding posts look like they will accept banana plugs.
Does anyone here use banana plugs???

 

[sdifox]

you should be able to unscrew the cap of the binding post, that should expose a hole through the shaft of the post and you just stick the bare wire through the hole and screw it on tight.

12GA should be fine for most receivers.

 

[Matt1970]

Yes, most banana connectors should also be binding post.

 

[Howard]

I prefer the open-style banana plugs. You can get both types at monoprice very cheaply when they're on sale.

 

[JSt0rm]

banana connectors are good for when you are doing a lot of connecting and disconnecting. I really dont see the point under normal situations.

 

[Howard]

banana connectors are good for when you are doing a lot of connecting and disconnecting. I really dont see the point under normal situations.

Spring terminal connections are the devil's work, especially with bare wire terminations... and not many people use actual pins.

 

[Pghpooh]

This is what the posts look like on the receiver.The only other way I can think of to get maximum contact is to "Split" the wire in half ( separate the copper strands into 2 sections) and insert the wire with half going to the top and the other half to the bottom.
I think I am wrong about the guage of wire, it should be 14 gauge.
Any suggestions to make this better?

 

[Howard]

image doesn't work

 

[JSt0rm]

Spring terminal connections are the devil's work, especially with bare wire terminations... and not many people use actual pins.

Yeah spring terminal suck. I'm more referring to how the picture above is. You can wrap a thick gauge copper around those posts no problem.

I haven't seen the spring ones in years.

 

[ProfJohn]

I use 100% banana plugs on my set up. SO much easier to plug in the speakers than trying to thread it through the little hole.

 

[Aharami]

i thought about going the banana plug route also, but decided against it. why waste more money, esp since the wires wont be disconnected for a while. I just put some solder on the bare wire ends to prevent fraying and slide it thru the hole that sdifox mentioned. Im using 12 gauge wire also

 

[Fallen Kell]

I use 10 gauge wire for my system and put banana plugs on both ends to make life easier. If you do go for banana plugs, the ones that work the best are ones that you solder on and have a non-conductive shield on the outside on all but the pin. Ones without the non-conductive shield will undoubtedly short out your amplifier at some point. The compression fit ones are fine for a year or three, but after that, the exposed copper of the wires will start to corrode and signal degradation will occur.

 

[novasatori]

luckily you can get like rolls of red and black heat shrink tubing to wrap your exposed banana plugs for like $7 on monoprice too, they are 100ft too so you will never have to worry about running out

🙂

I bought like 14 closed plugs and a roll of black and red heat shrink for pretty cheap from there when I did my system.

 

[The Boston Dangler]

I use 100% banana plugs on my set up. SO much easier to plug in the speakers than trying to thread it through the little hole.

exactly

 

[Matt1970]

This is what the posts look like on the receiver.The only other way I can think of to get maximum contact is to "Split" the wire in half ( separate the copper strands into 2 sections) and insert the wire with half going to the top and the other half to the bottom.
I think I am wrong about the guage of wire, it should be 14 gauge.
Any suggestions to make this better?

Maximum Contact is the key. Any spot where there is not good contact or too small a gauge of speaker wire will cause resistance and they will in turn reduce sound quality as well as amplifier efficiency.