[sdiy] [semi-ot] making patch cables with thin console cable.

[Michael E Caloroso]

"Gold plated" is a very vague description loosely thrown around a lot.
Many datasheets do not reveal anything about alloys mixed with the gold,
how thin the plating is, or how many carats the gold is!  Caveat emptor.

Consumer level low cost gold plated plugs/jacks are to be avoided.  Besides
the unspecified purity of the plating, the plating is extremely thin
(usually under 10um) and will wear off with repeated insertions - some
datasheets report a maximum life of ten insertions!  Once the plating is
breached, that exposes the underlying metal which corrodes or oxidizes very
quickly when exposed to air.  My experience with gold plated plugs was
disappointing enough that I never repeated the experience.

The only applications of gold plated interconnects in my studio are
board-to-board interconnects for critical power rail and CV lines, which I
had installed in my Memorymoog and other synths with great success.  Of
course those interconnects are military grade components with minimum 10um
plating and high purity gold.  The oldest ones are 30+ years old and still
free of problems.

Tin plating on plugs does corrode/wear off, albeit over much longer time.
I have stage cables that I built over 40 years ago; they got a lot of use
and the tin plating of the Switchcraft plugs finally wore off after 25
years of heavy use, exposing the underlying brass core material which
oxidized quickly thus requiring replacing the plugs.  Amazingly the
original Columbia raw cable is still going strong.  Thinking that the
non-copper strands in the cable can oxidize (I've had it happen), I just
checked the conductance between solder joints (two wire measurement on DMM)
on the plugs; 5 of 7 cables registered zero ohms, the worse reading of the
other two was 0.3 ohms.  And during the process, I caught a plug in its
early stage of corrosion on the sleeve plating.

MC

On Sun, Sep 6, 2026 at 11:53 AM Mattias Rickardsson <mr at analogue.org> wrote:

> I don't have any good advice on what exact product to buy, but it seems
> like a general "avoid the lowest-budget end" makes sense. Half a year ago I
> bought 10 of the cheapest gold-plated plugs available at Digi-Key or Mouser
> or Farnell - don't remember more than that they were very cheap but at
> least gold-plated - for just making zero-ohm shorted testing plugs for a
> project.
>
> When using them I was surprised to experience that some of them didn't fit
> the jacks properly. The tip, the ring, and the plastic insulation piece in
> between them were not really aligned well, so they ended up slightly too
> large to fit in some jacks where I'd never had any problems with any plugs
> for 15 years.
>
> And last week I noticed that all of them had a lot of corrosion/dirt on
> the "gold". After half a year! My other cables in the same place are still
> fine after 10+ years, being some mid-price Cordial product with at least a
> brand name on the actual plugs.
>
> I guess you often get what you pay for. :-)
>
> /mr
>
> Den lör 5 sep. 2026 18:45Jimmy Moore via Synth-diy <
> synth-diy at synth-diy.org> skrev:
>
>> I got a great deal on a spool of mogami w2944, so time to revive the
>> patchbay project.   This is console wire, so has a very thin OD of about
>> 2.54mm:
>>
>> https://mogamicable.com/category/bulk/console/#gsc.tab=0
>>
>> I foresee this causing some challenges with audio jacks that are designed
>> around much beefier wire.
>>
>> I'm curious if anyone had suggestions for preferred (1/4") connectors for
>> this kind of thing.  I have a samson S-patch plus, so no TT or bantam jacks
>> for me just yet.
>>
>> I suspect the recommendation will be heat shrink tubing + neutrik jacks.
>> I would love to hear what you think.
>>
>> jimmy
>>
>> PS: if anyone has some spare jacks or heat shrink you would be interested
>> to sell, let me know!
>>
>>
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