Locking Banana comparison

[waynel]

I’ve been happily using Bluejeans locking bananas on one end of my Canare 4S11 speaker cables (the other end has a SpeakON connector) and thought I would add locking banana termination to another set of speaker cables for my living room system.

I’ve seen Nakamichi locking banana plugs listed on eBay and thought I’d give them a try as they were reasonably priced ($23 for 4 pairs shipped) so I ordered some from http://www.nakamichiplug.com/. Overall I am dissatisfied with them and ordered more blue jeans locking banana plugs to replace them.
Since I now have both, I thought others can benefit from a comparison

lead times: The Nakamichi plugs took 4 weeks to arrive with no tracking while the blue jeans plugs arrived in 2 days
customer service: I have found blue jeans to be very responsive in the past although I did not have to contact them for this order. Nakamichi plug still hasn’t responded to my “where’s my order” email nor my request for a return.


here are the two plugs side by side: blue jeans on the bottom

the Bluejeans plug has a removable collar to accommodate different jacket sizes as shown below while the Nakamichi opening is huge

the following photo shows the two plugs disasembled ( Bluejeans on the left)

the main problem is that the Nakamichi plug screws are not long enough to clamp down securely on these 11 gauge cables, maybe they would work on giant cables but not on reasonably large cables.


this is the Bluejeans plug assembled

And a comparison of the Bluejeans vs Nakamichi plugs assembled

In addition to the insecure fit of the Nakimichi plug they also tended to get stuck in the locked position even when the collar was unscrewed
overall I rate the Bluejeans plug excellent and the Nakamichi plug poor. I will be returning the Nakamichi plugs if they respond to my email and honor their stated 30 day return policy.

Wayne

 

[Fledermaus]

Thanks for sharing. I for one am a fan and faithful user of those :

https://www.audiophonics.fr/en/bana...nana-plug-gold-plated-o7mm-set-x4-p-2611.html

 

[amirm]

I use the parts express ones:

The plastic knobs are hard on hands to unscrew a bit but otherwise, they are very nice and easy to terminate just about any cable into them.

 

[Blumlein 88]

Back when I had speakers with such inputs I in time found I didn't like locking banana plugs. A good snug fitting conventional dual banana was the way to go. I had much fewer connection issues over time with those.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

In addition to the insecure fit of the Nakimichi plug they also tended to get stuck in the locked position even when the collar was unscrewed
overall

I've not used the Nakamichi but the BlueJeans sometimes do this, too.

 

[gene_stl]

You should open a case at ebay. That usually gets a sellers attention.

 

[Sal1950]

I've not used the Nakamichi but the BlueJeans sometimes do this, too.

That's been my experience with many locking connectors. I had some RCA's from a place I can't remember now that did the same.

 

[VintageFlanker]

Thanks for sharing. I for one am a fan and faithful user of those :
https://www.audiophonics.fr/en/bana...nana-plug-gold-plated-o7mm-set-x4-p-2611.html

Very similar for cheaper.

I'm very satisfied with those on my 4S11, recently upgraded:

 

[Burning Sounds]

I had the same issue as @waynel with some generic locking plugs similar to the Nakamichis. The grub screws are too short (I use Canare 4S11, too). As a workaround I got some microbore copper pipe, slid it over the bare cable ends and soldered it in place. Then I could get the grub screws fastened down tight onto the copper pipe. Works well.

 

[bigjacko]

Is it better to solder on the wire to plug or just use screw to fasten it? I was always thinking fasten has higher resistance and may even rust a bit due to not sealed by solder. What are you guys thought about this?

 

[Doodski]

Is it better to solder on the wire to plug or just use screw to fasten it? I was always thinking fasten has higher resistance and may even rust a bit due to not sealed by solder. What are you guys thought about this?

Metal on metal fittings can produce a gas tight seal but that depends on that connection not being bent and moved. I prefer to solder on banana jacks. My active crossover tri-amp'd home system had the wires soldered right on the drivers and then to the banana jacks at the amps.

 

[Harmonie]

Is it better to solder on the wire to plug or just use screw to fasten it? I was always thinking fasten has higher resistance and may even rust a bit due to not sealed by solder. What are you guys thought about this?

Another way is to crimp the cable before with these

 

[tvrgeek]

I prefer spade lugs. Fraction of a penny per plug and you can snug them down tight. Even a tinned lead into a 5-way works perfectly. There are lots of places to spend money, this is not one of them for me.

decent RCA is harder. As they were originally designed for RF use, the braid was to be soldered uniformly around the shell. Very hard to do by hand. If done correctly, they are good through UHF, so those who claim they can't transmit audio have been dipping into the cool-aid. Not grounding chassis before plugging can cause ESD damage, but that is operator error, not a design fault. They were not designed to be idiot proof.

Science for those not afraid:
Metal on metal depends on the metals and the underlaying substrates. The force to make a gas-tight is pretty high. You are not likely to do so without a tool. Less that that you are subjected to fretting corrosion. This is where the substrate, usually nickel or tin, bleeds through the gold layer, that happens to be quite porous. The micro-vibrations roll the oxides into little balls that list the connection apart. This is why unplugging and re-plugging works. It wipes it away for a while. To avoid this, best practice is a thicker layer of silver as solver oxide has the same conductivity as silver. SOP for RF equipment. Never been popular for consumer goods as it looks ugly, brown and black crud. Another way to maintain a non corroding connection is with dielectric grease. This is SOP in all cars now. It keeps the telephone system working. Messy, but perfectly effective. Very little force is needed to maintain the point contacts and the grease blocks oxygen, so no corrosion. Just a tiny film of petroleum jelly is all you need. Ma-Bell spent millions of dollars to find that out. You get it for free.

If you think those fancy e-bay gold plated connections are great, I can tell you, the plating is so thin as to be useless. Gold is deposited in little specs, and it builds up in a porous film. To make it impervious to bleed takes 4 or 6 times the customary plating thickness. We studied these things in the failure analysis lab.

 

[restorer-john]

I don't use locking banana plugs or screw down RCA plugs. Personally I think they are a stupid idea.

The destruction of front panels, casework, speakers and chassis mounted 4mm/RCA sockets I have seen over the years caused by such designs would make your collective heads spin.

Imagine tripping over or catching the speaker wire on standmounted speakers or slim towers with locking bananas. Instead of pulling out, they pull the speaker onto the floor. Their weight also means when they swing and hit something, they leave a big mark or scratch.

I still use quality Japanese 4mm banana plugs (nickel plated over copper IIRC) I originally bought decades ago, maybe 100 of each, red and black. The same ones I use on my test gear also get used for the various speaker cables.

 

[mSpot]

Several non-locking banana plugs have been suggested in this thread. FWIW, Benchmark Media do not recommend them:

https://benchmarkmedia.com/products/benchmark-speaker-cable-nl2-to-banana-2-pole

​

In our lab tests we have found that heavy-duty 40-amp SpeakON™ connectors consistently outperform spade lugs, pins, and banana plugs. The SpeakON™ connectors provide a reliable low-impedance connection that can withstand high-currents. Of the more traditional speaker connectors, we have found that locking banana plugs provide the next best connections. In contrast, spade lugs and pins often provide poor connections. Spring-type (non-locking) banana plugs almost always provide poor connections and should be avoided.​

 

[Helicopter]

I prefer spade lugs. Fraction of a penny per plug and you can snug them down tight. Even a tinned lead into a 5-way works perfectly. ....

I use tinned leads. Agree. Perfection.

 

[bigjacko]

Less that that you are subjected to fretting corrosion.

Thank you for spreading knowledge around, did not know fretting corrosion exist. For "less that" do you mean if we did not apply enough force to fasten the wire to plug, we will get fretting corrosion? And later on you said that we can we use dielectric grease to stop air going in if we did not fasten tight enough?

 

[restorer-john]

Spring-type (non-locking) banana plugs almost always provide poor connections and should be avoided.

That's just utter hogwash and Benchmark should know better. There's billions of multimeters with bananas, millions of bench instruments with bananas and none of them would dream suggesting locking bananas. Tell me what Fluke fits to their multimeters, Keithly or Audio Precision. No silly gold plated 4mm sockets there. No locking bananas supplied. Nobody suggests they are inadequate.

Contact area is huge, connection is positive and resistance is low. They are meant to be plugged in and out all the time like they are on test gear. Self wiping contacts designed for quick, positive connections.

Never meant for speakers or permanent connections.

 

[richard12511]

I've stopped using locking bananna plugs, as 3 times now I've had them get stuck in the locked position. Trying to get them unlocked ends up breaking the plugs and leaving bits of metal stuck in the socket.

Below is one of the broken plugs

Also, I like to swap speakers a lot, and it's just easier if they're not locking.

 

[michaelahess]

That's just utter hogwash and Benchmark should know better. There's billions of multimeters with bananas, millions of bench instruments with bananas and none of them would dream suggesting locking bananas. Tell me what Fluke fits to their multimeters, Keithly or Audio Precision. No silly gold plated 4mm sockets there. No locking bananas supplied. Nobody suggests they are inadequate.

Contact area is huge, connection is positive and resistance is low. They are meant to be plugged in and out all the time like they are on test gear. Self wiping contacts designed for quick, positive connections.

Never meant for speakers or permanent connections.

This! I'm a network engineer, banana plugs are used for all our coax testing gear, all our DC monitoring gear, etc. I use the cheap monoprice bananas for all my speakers and amps/receivers. Almost always through female to female in wall plates. I've used many hundreds of them. Almost every time the speakers would have been either tinned&pinned or just raw wire into the devices binding posts.

Never once have I had corrosion issues or any notable difference in sound.

Just because connector types can have measurable differences, doesn't mean it matters to us little meat bags.