In wall speaker Wire interference

[WVHomeCinema]

I’m installing a 7.2.4 home cinema. I’m using 12 gage twisted copper wire. I’ve tried to have all my power wires run so that they won’t be close to my speaker wire, but in a couple places I will have to intersect and also run parallel in a couple places where the speaker and electrical wires will run closer than 12 inches from each other. I’ve seen conflicting info where some say don’t worry about it and others say you should never place the 2 wires within 12 inches of each other. Any thoughts? I’ve purchased flexible tinned copper braided conduit for EMI, RFI, and ESD protection to run my CAT cable through to shield it from the power wires. Should I also use this same conduit to run my speaker wire through in the locations where it will be near power wires, or should I not worry about it? Also would running the speaker wire through the tinned copper conduit cause more harm than good for some reason?

 

[Swerd]

Hi and welcome to AudioHolics!

I’m installing a 7.2.4 home cinema. I’m using 12 gage twisted copper wire. I’ve tried to have all my power wires run so that they won’t be close to my speaker wire, but in a couple places I will have to intersect and also run parallel in a couple places where the speaker and electrical wires will run closer than 12 inches from each other. I’ve seen conflicting info where some say don’t worry about it and others say you should never place the 2 wires within 12 inches of each other. Any thoughts?

If I remember correctly, running speaker wires and AC power lines parallel to each other with a 12" separation is OK. You should avoid parallel runs closer than 6" apart.

You'll know you have a problem if you hear a 60 Hz hum through your speakers.

I’ve purchased flexible tinned copper braided conduit for EMI, RFI, and ESD protection to run my CAT cable through to shield it from the power wires. Should I also use this same conduit to run my speaker wire through in the locations where it will be near power wires, or should I not worry about it? Also would running the speaker wire through the tinned copper conduit cause more harm than good for some reason?

I don't think you really need shielding for speaker wires, but it won't do any harm. The idea of using conduit of one kind or another may be useful. In the future, if you ever need to replace the speaker wires, you'll be glad you took the effort to use conduit. Try running some of your speaker wire through a length of that flexible conduit to see if it allows running in your 12g twisted pair wires easily. If not, get some standard rigid conduit for the speaker wires.