Since I'm beautifying my makeshift home theater room slowly as well as moving some of the components to my so-called "Budget Listening Room", one of the things I recently had an excuse to purchase was a couple sets of
Belkin's Pure AV Banana Plugs. While the official MRSP ($19.99 per set of four) may be a little steep, a set can be obtained more reasonably for around ten to twelve dollars. The price is far from the cheapest around, but I was willing to pay a bit for looks, non-fully conductive plugs (I'm a touch paranoid, I suppose), and the lack of crimping (which would kill any chance of recycling the plugs).
The contents of the package (figure 2) are a small manual, a small wrench, and four relatively standard three piece banana plugs. Unscrewing the bottom of a plug leaves its center exposed and a small screw lock can be seen. Using the little wrench to loosen the screw allows the wire to be inserted at which point you can re-tighten the screw. It's a pretty standard procedure as far as banana plugs go.
Instead of a traditional leaf spring connector, there is a channel in the connector that allows it to collapse when inserted. In the couple of terminals I plugged the banana plugs into, this seemed to allow a good, tight connection.
If one is accustomed to smaller banana plugs, these ones are relatively large as far as height is concerned. I had to pull my receiver an additional inch forward to be able to use these new plugs due to my TV stand being poorly designed with a large flat metal "pole" behind the center of the shelves.
I do have a small note, however. The
website claims the plugs will accept 8-gauge wire. On the packaging only the ability to accept 12-gauge is claimed. If you look at the openings on the plug center and bottom (figure 3), you'll see the bottom can easily accept 8-gauge wire and any reasonable covering but the center would make it a little more difficult. The 12-gauge wire I used fit just fine, but 8-gauge might be a stretch. At least the packaging is correct.
