Connecting RCA Wall Plates?

[derekwwww]

I bought some RCA wall plates for my stereo so I can use my zone 2 for my kitchen and took one out to see how to hook up the back of the wall plate. Do I just run 2 pairs of speaker wire for inbetween the two wall plates and solder + of one speaker wire to the inside stub, and put the - under the nut? Or are there special wires I need to run for these? Thanks.....

 

[jaxvon]

What kind of signal are you trying to send to the kitchen? Low level preamp outputs? If so, you need some bulk coaxial cable. I'd suggest some Belden 1505F or Canare LV-77S. If you're just running speakers in the kitchen, then you shouldn't need RCA wall plates. Just run some speaker wire from the Zone 2 outputs of the amp section on your reciever and to the speakers.

 

[derekwwww]

It will be a low level signal to a AUX on a mini system for in the kitchen. Can this coaxial be purhased from ebay or what store would have it? Thanks alot for the help!

 

[jaxvon]

You could try Westlake Electronic. They have a great selection of top quality stuff at good cheap prices. When connecting the cable, the shield goes to the barrel and the center conductor goes to the pin.

You can always get cheaper coax, but the 1505F and LV-77S are both well-shielded, and if memory serves correctly, the LV-77S is more flexible because of its stranded center conductor.

Just look in the bulk cable section and search for the model names I listed above. The 1505F is Belden brand and the LV-77S is Canare brand.

Edit: unless you feel like buying 1000ft of coax, I'd just go for the Belden. You can purchase it by the foot. Here's a link to the page

 

[BMXTRIX]

Your first post is a little confusing... I think the second one clears it up.

1. You have a mini-system in the kitchen that is already hooked up to speakers.

2. You want to run something from your main system's zone 2 to the aux input on the mini system in the kitchen.

3. You are not connecting SPEAKERS to anything - you are connecting the RCA outputs of one system to the RCA inputs of another system.

As jaxvon said, you can use coaxial cable. You need two runs of it - one for the left channel, one for the right channel. You could just use a long audio interconnect (not speaker cable!) but this would be more of a headache then it is worth and likely wouldn't provide good shielding.

Home Depot offers RG-6 quad shield coaxial cable for about $60.00 for 500 feet. Likely far more than you need, but do some math when shopping online and include shipping and think about how you may use it in the future. You can solder RCA connections onto the cable or crimp on F-type connections and use an F to RCA adapter if you would like.

The hard part is getting the cable from one location to the other - once that is done, terminating the ends and hooking it up is easy.

 

[derekwwww]

Yes BMXTRIX you got it correct, that is what I'm doing. When you say coaxial cable do you mean the same cable that is used on satellite and cable TV situations? Or is there a different coaxial I'm supposed to use? If it's just the regular stuff thats great because my dad is an electrician and has a full box of the stuff. But the center conductor isnt stranded, just a solid copper wire with the insulation around it and then the outer sheath conductor then the covering. Thanks for all the help guys, much appreciated!

 

[jaxvon]

That's the stuff. There are different varieties. The only advantage of the stranded center conductor is that it's more flexible than the solid wire stuff. It's also more expensive. You just pay for the convenience. If you already have access to it, then why spend money?

 

[BMXTRIX]

As jaxvon said.

That stuff used for satellite and cable TV, when you don't care about how flexible the cable is, is some of the best stuff on the market for the least expensive price. Top notch - use it!

Your dad likely can help you with the terminating of the wires to F-type connectors or soldering to RCA type connectors if he knows his stuff. Good bonding time = bonus!