Thick as shit question - will any kettle lead work to power an amplifier?

theflyisback

theflyisback said:

One of the 3 leads sounds remarkably a lot better plugged into the laney than the other 2 for some unlogical reason.  Reduces the hum and hiss. 

The other two probably have faulty earth connections - it may just be that the 'fingers' of the contacts inside the hole may have been opened out too far so they aren't touching, or the problem could be at the plug end - or the good one is a specialist cable with suppression caps in it.

There is no other way a mains cable can affect the sound or the background noise of an amp.

The ‘good’ cable is the one that came with my strymon zuma. The other ones are most likely from PCs.  One may have come from a big pile of wires from the praccy room.

to add to the conundrum the good cable goes nicely in and out of the amp socket whereas the others need a bit of a light fiddle to come away easily. 

No no such fuss with other inputs though, I.e my zuma or other amps. 

Im not making this up!

Gassage

If you put water in them and touch the tip of your tongue you'll be able to work out if the lead is OK or not.

Legionreturns

My cables bag for YBTB sessions has a compartment for power leads, which includes at least 20 IEC leads varying from 1m to 10m long, and daisy chain IEC leads for using with my disco lights which have through power sockets. They are pretty much interchangeable between amps, active speaker stacks, mixing desk and lights. 

No kettle though 

ICBM

theflyisback said:

Im not making this up!

I believe you, but there will be a simple real physical explanation - it's not like you're claiming that one cable makes your amp sound magically "more transparent" with "more detail", or a "wider soundstage" or any of the usual audiofool bollocks .

The fit of the plug in the socket is more to do with the plastic than the contacts usually.

Rocker

I don't recall ever owning an electric kettle that had a detachable cable.  When serving my time as an electrician, I repaired boilers and electric kettles that used round female plugs that plugged into a socket on the boiler/kettle.  If the kettle boiled dry, the plug was ejected from the kettle.  No real idea how the IEC cable came to be described as a kettle lead (having noted what @ICBM wrote above)

Jonathanthomas83

Shall I change the title? I'm sorry to all those offended.

theflyisback

You’d think in this day and age we could run our amps without bloody wires. Perhaps a internal battery generator type thing that charges itself the more you rock out.

my mums Lexus does it 

Pablocrackers

Rocker said:

I don't recall ever owning an electric kettle that had a detachable cable.  When serving my time as an electrician, I repaired boilers and electric kettles that used round female plugs that plugged into a socket on the boiler/kettle.  If the kettle boiled dry, the plug was ejected from the kettle.  No real idea how the IEC cable came to be described as a kettle lead (having noted what @ICBM wrote above)

Yeh the old kettles did man but they werent like nowadays kettles where we have a base which the kettle sits on they were like one whole unit which the “kettle lead” plugged into at the bottom no base. Kinda like this crap - see link https://www.google.com/search?q=old+electric+kettle&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwjAquXH1cjhAhUN5IUKHXWsA90Q2-cCegQIABAC&oq=old+electric+kettle&gs_l=mobile-gws-wiz-img.3..0j0i7i30.129158.132165..132916...0.0..0.84.992.14......0....1.........30i10j35i304i39j0i13j0i67.ETb3x8V_iaE&ei=N4evXICzCY3IlwT12I7oDQ&bih=638&biw=375&prmd=sivn&rlz=1CDGOYI_enGB815GB815&hl=en-GB#imgrc=QacA2UegptqhBM

Philtre

Jonathanthomas83 said:

Shall I change the title? I'm sorry to all those offended.

No.

If it's any help I'm thick as shit too - after reading this thread I got confused and plugged my guitar into the kettle. Suddenly I was playing Smoke on the Water.

Kittyfrisk

Jonathanthomas83 said:

Shall I change the title? I'm sorry to all those offended.

No pasaran! 

theflyisback

Philtre said:

Jonathanthomas83 said:

Shall I change the title? I'm sorry to all those offended.

No.

If it's any help I'm thick as shit too - after reading this thread I got confused and plugged my guitar into the kettle. Suddenly I was playing Smoke on the Water.

Me too, but instead I started playing a load of ‘Tea’-Rex riffs

ICBM

When I was testing a Hiwatt 400 I made a dummy load out of an old kettle and plugged it into the amp. After a few minutes it started playing Tea For One.

pintspiller

I worked for a printing company and lifted bags of unrequired kettle leads from the Mac graveyard upstairs. I still have a collection of grey leads in assorted lengths that I whip out when required.

Rocker

Philtre said:

Jonathanthomas83 said:

Shall I change the title? I'm sorry to all those offended.

No.

If it's any help I'm thick as shit too - after reading this thread I got confused and plugged my guitar into the kettle. Suddenly I was playing Smoke on the Water.

Better SOTW than The water is wide......