Okay so I'm production manager for a play in Oxford and I need to have a giant cardboard box drop from the ceiling triggered by an actor with a remote control on stage.I've found a rather nice electromagnet which should do the job which is triggered by a 9V battery. The trigger is an IR unit I'm building which finishes with a relay. The question is can I use a sound XLR cable as the wires in my circuit between the battery with the IR unit and the electromagnet?i.e.Electromagnet -----XLR-----gt; battery -------XLR-----gt; IR unitStandard XLR's do have 3 cables in and surely I only need 2 to complete the circuit.The only reason I'm thinking about using XLRs is that I'm not sure of the distance between things yet and I have plenty of XLRs in many different lengths.Any ideas?
I have used XLR cables for a lot of different purposes some are: Added a push button adapter to the end of a XLR so that a weather person could change weather graphics. Made RJ-11 telephone to XLR adapter for temporary telephone. Low power speaker cables. Even used them for mic cables. Belden 8412 is a thick rubber coated audio cable that is like a tank . . . it is hard to destroy you could short a 9 volt on the opposite end and not damage the cable. Use pins 23 for your project and if possible, connect pin 1 to an earth ground or common from your battery. Hope this helps. D.bumstead
This is done a lot in professional broadcast, except we use 4 pin xlr connectors to prevent inadvertant connection of DC to the audio system. Generally this is to power cameras or portable recorders requiring 12 volts at one or two amps.
Yes, you can use your XLR cables and plugs and connectors for a low power 9VDC application. Before you start doing all this, just make sure how many ohms your electromagnet coil has. If it is below 20 ohms, then you can not use a small 9V battery - you need a larger, more powerful battery, such as a stack of 6 AA cells that would easily deliver 1 A or more.
