We were contacted by a client complaining that 2 of his speakers “just stopped working”. Upon investigation we discovered that during some renovations in another part of the home they had discovered an issue with mice, decomposing bodies in ceiling and wall cavities – YUCK! Well, mice teeth never stop growing. What better than standard zip cord (lamp wire) to give those chompers a work out!
When we removed the non working speaker, we discovered that, in fact, the speaker was fine, however, the wire attached to the speaker was NOT! A light tug on the wire and a small section came right out with the tell tale signs that something was having lunch! If you zoom in on the picture you can actually see the tooth marks! Rodents are attracted to the dielectric (the clear rubbery coating on the outside of lamp cord). apparently they consider it a tasty snack – not so tasty for the long term performance of your audio system! Certified in wall rated speaker wire along with other qualities are quite unpleasant to the palate of rodents (as well as being FT4/6 fire retardant and pure copper construction) and as such the varmints leave them alone! If you are building or renovating contact Wired 1 Consulting to make sure you have the RIGHT WIRE in your walls and ceiling!
Why you DON’T use lampcord for in-wall speaker wiring!
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