On 10/07/2018 02:31 PM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
On Sun, 7 Oct 2018 13:25:08 -0400, Tim wrote:
On 10/07/2018 04:45 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
On Sat, 2018-10-06 at 17:36 -0400, Tim wrote:
On 10/06/2018 03:51 PM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
https://www.roland.com/us/products/gkc-5_10/
Most folks become aware that even the best quality single-conductor
(with shield ground) 1/4" guitar cables eventually break. It
happens to all of them. Usually at the entry point to the plug, or
in the plug itself.
Hi,
I confirm this and most likely anybody else does, too.
Now take that hard-learned experience with a single-conductor cable
and apply it to *thirteen* conductors. Guess what happens...
(Jacks for these DIN type plugs are usually never a problem if
secured and soldered properly. Usually far less trouble than
other types of jacks.)
Often, the cause of the cable's break is the plug's strain relief
being too tight - ironically the very thing that is supposed
to help prevent breakage in the first place.
I can't be too harsh on this product for the price/weight range.
But yeah, buy TWO of them to be safe.
Hi,
the reason that I like to get more information about this Roland
cable is, that there are a lot of less expensive 13 pin DIN cables
available by the Internet and I do not only need a backup cable, I
also want to get a shorter cable than those sold by Roland.
Some of the non-Roland cables seem to be without a locking mechanism,
but other provide a locking mechanism, e.g. the CD changer cables. I
wonder about the used cables. Are all cable cores of the original
Roland cable audio cables or are the cores a mix of different kind
of cables? Do other 13-pin DIN cables provide the same pin to pin
connection as the Roland cable? Since we know that some elChepo
audio cables are ok for 50 cm short cables, but 3 m long cables
worsen sound quality, while more expensive cables are still ok for
cables way longer than 3 m, I wonder what 13-pole cables are good
and which are bad. When using the Roland cable for the "normal"
guitar pickups, too, the sound quality of the audio signal from the
"normal" pickups is good. Unfortunately there is no printing on the
Roland cables. If I want to build my own cables, what cables and
what jacks might be good?
My favoured electronic part dealer provides only one 13-pin din jack
that fits, it's without locking mechanism and seemingly an elCheapo.
The dealer calls it "monitor plug" and yes, my Atari SM124 has got a
13-pin din jack without locking mechanism, too. The dealer seems not
to sell any 13 cores cables at all.
Ordering jacks and cable from perhaps different dealers + time
exposure might not be worth the effort, to build a non-Roland cable,
but perhaps ordering a CD changer cable could be a solution to
replace an original Roland cable.
Regards,
Ralf
Hm, I'm seeing wildly varying prices for the cables on ebay.
The originals seem... a little over-priced.
I can see why you'd be shopping around, I would too :-)
Best advice I would say is read any user reviews accompanying them,
since they seem to be from people who actually use them for this
specific purpose.
Usually I wouldn't worry about the locking mech, but in this case
since one end goes into the guitar that would be important.
Most of the ones I'm seeing appear to have the lock.
Be sure to only look at ones that are for this Roland-compatible
purpose. Other cables may be 13 pins but they may not be
pin-compatible, and even if they are, the wires and shield may
not be a good thickness, insulation, stiffness etc.
Especially those CD changer cables, may not be the right thing.
In those, some of the wires may be individually shielded which
carry audio, and the other wires may be just control signals,
so it's not really the right thing.
Randomly selected, this one for example promises to be pretty good:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/usa-seller-LOCKING-13-PIN-CABLE-SYNTH-ROLAND-GKC-3-VG-8-GR-VG-GK-2A-MOORE-10-FT-/281387018954
I was going to talk about the GKC wires carrying raw, weak un-buffered
signals from the pickup... but it turns out that's *not* true !
Looky here, I found a schematic of the GK2/3 at the top of this page:
https://www.vguitarforums.com/smf/index.php?topic=73.0
And here is the VG-88 service manual:
https://elektrotanya.com/roland_vg-88_sm.pdf/download.html
According to those diagrams, the cable carries power,
and *buffered* signals, and some up/down switches and
volume control signals.
Therefore, some of the wires (the six pickup signals) might be
individually shielded and the others not, with a master shield
ground surrounding the whole lot.
Thus the cable core itself may be a special cable not easily
found to buy. But I'm not sure, possibly a normal 13-conductor
cable would actually be OK since the signals are buffered.
After reviewing more of the pictures in my first link,
I'll tip my overly-cautious hat in favour of a good ol'
regular 13-conductor cable with just an outer shield.
Which makes sense I suppose, 13 individually shielded
signal wires would make a much thicker cable !
So you could have a chance to make your own if you can find the wire.
Further note about 1/4" cables: I happened picked up a latest
guitar magazine last night and thumbing through the pages
I see some nice looking professional cables which have angled
plugs and the wire itself is flat and sufficiently covered by
the plug casing as to apparently not easily break.
Nice to see some thought went into them.
T.
If you find such a wire and decide to attempt to make your
own cable, some advice I can offer is to have a can of
technician 'freeze spray' handy. Or a can of compressed
air 'duster' (Dust-Off etc.) turned upside down will also do.
The reason is that when attempting to solder such tiny wires
to such plug pins, you only have a few millimeters of exposed
copper followed by a few millimeters of wire insulation before
the wire disappears into the cable.
The heat from the soldering iron can *easily* melt that insulation
and before you know it you have a mess of melted insulation on
your hands and you'll have to cut the cable and start over.
So after each application of heat from the iron, be sure to
immediately freeze the area to prevent the heat from traveling
further down the wire melting the insulation.
Also you'd better have nerves of steel and steady hands
soldering thirteen tiny wires to thirteen tiny plug pins.
It can be frustrating, I know.
Probably not worth the effort, I would buy a cable.
Tim.
Thank you Tim :)
it was my profession to solder professional audio gear, but that time I
had eyes like gimlets and used professional soldering stations.
Nowadays, with reading glasses, an elChepo magnifier (no professional
magnifying spectacles) and several good soldering irons (but no
soldering station, let alone hot air), I dislike to solder such jacks.
If possible I'm in favour of buying a ready to use cable of that kind
and 3 m (10 foot) is exactly what I'm looking for.
I will continue to search myself, since shipping costs make several
alternative cables as expensive as an original Roland cable.
However, your hints helped a lot :). Again, thank you very much for the
pointers.
Regards,
Ralf
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