STEREO MICROPHONE CABLE

TWO MICROPHONE CABLES IN A SINGLE CABLE

by Mark King for proworkshop.com

Twin mic leads exit a jacket which is just slightly bigger than a standard single mic cable

I use a coincident pair of microphones over my drum set, it's always been sort of messy and fiddly with two cables and some clamps or velcro to hold it all up out of the way of the performer below. If you want to make adjustments then you've got to deal with both cables and it just seems like unnecessary technical clutter. Here is how I fixed the problem.
I am constantly trying to improve the performance of our drum room and getting signal to that pair of microphones was on my radar. After searching my favorite parts suppliers I settled on some wire supplied by Redco. It is under the multipair category so I guess you could consider this a two-channel mic snake. The Redco brand is TGS, The Good Stuff!

Solders nicely to connectors

 I've built several multichannel cables using the Redco wire and I'm very satisfied with the sonic performance. It is easy to work with, the copper inside solders well using tin/lead solder and it is available by the foot for a reasonable price. I've been buying 100 feet or more at a time to achieve better pricing.

TIP: Label the pin numbers with a marker so it is more obvious, minimizes errors

Redco also has fair prices on Switchcraft A3F and A3M connectors which I prefer on my microphone and XLR based cable connections.

HOW DOES IT WORK?
This cable is just like a standard microphone cable but there are two connectors at each end.

On my drum overhead stereo mic cable I made the "mic end" leads a little longer as individual cables to allow for more flexible adjustments plugging in to the microphones. Also on the mic end of this snake I did not put heat shrink over the inner conductors because I wanted to keep the mass of these cables as low as possible and keep them as flexible as possible.

I like these dual XLR cables, I've made several more since I began this article and they are very handy for keeping the floor clear during sessions with several people here. When Mary and I rehearse I run a single twin-mic cable to near our two mic stands and the other end to the mixer, then I use a couple of short mini-Mogami microphone cables to connect our stage microphones to the twin-mic cable.

I have also made some twin-channel TRS to TRS cables with this Redco cable and I love them. I needed a custom length to get from our keyboard mixer to the patch bay, a TRS to TRS twin-channel cable has fit the requirement perfectly.

Every time I order 100-feet of this two-channel wire I build more cables :-)

If you don't want to make your own Redco will build these for you. They have a custom cable area on their web site or you can call on the phone and talk to a human.

Here is a link to the two channel bulk cable I used.

Good music to all!