Vintage Guitar Tones: How Curly Cables help ⚡️
The best coiled guitar cables are more than just a vintage aesthetic. They look killer, don’t get me wrong, but they should also enhance your tone, creative process, and most importantly, not let you down.
In this blog, our first blog on the subject, I’ll be outlining why we love recreating vintage tones and what makes our Voltage Vintage Coils® the best coiled/curly cables available for guitarists looking for a great-sounding, reliable guitar cable.
Nostalgia - A feeling and Sound.
I remember when I first began playing guitar as a kid, I was always so keen to create the sounds I heard through my dad’s old radio. I grew up with probably one of the best introductions to that iconic era of music a kid could ask for. Music was constantly played in my family home, weeknights and weekends. I was introduced to artists like the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Frank Sinatra, U2, Pink Floyd, Sabbath, etc. etc. You get the picture.
As an obsessed guitarist, we all have the one riff that changes our perception of what a guitar can do and make us feel — and other people feel, for that matter. For me, I have a few. It was hearing “Little Wing” by Jimi, “Money for Nothing” by Dire Straits, and “Kashmir” by Zeppelin. Those songs/riffs completely changed the trajectory of my guitar-playing journey. When I heard those songs and then learned how to play them (on my free Samick SG copy), it was game over.
I knew from that moment guitar would be a lifelong pursuit. This addiction we all love and share as guitarists runs deep. I think that’s why our cool little guitar industry is so gear-obsessed, and finding new or old sounds is what we’re all about. I mean… look at the rise of boutique effects pedals and vintage fuzz circuits, for example — crazy good times we’re living.
In my opinion, one of the reasons we chase these tones is that they bring us back to the feelings we felt when we first fell in love with guitar playing. That music influenced us all, and I suppose after all this time, chasing the tones of that iconic era is still very real and alive.
Most guitarists play a Stratocaster, Tele or Lp — my go-to is a Broadcaster.
Guitar had such an influence, I ended up working at the local guitar store and then, fast forward to now, founding my own guitar cable company. Cables always were a fun interest early on. I loved amps too, but really, when I noticed my gear would sound different with certain types of cables —less copper, more, cheaper vs. expensive — it sparked a curiosity that has evolved into building my own cable brand to help recreate those tones and solve some of the issues I faced, like cable failure and bad signal.
Coiled cables, Curly Cables, Spiral Cables, Coily Cords..
OK — now, enough about me and how magical the guitar is, and more about this cool niche: coiled guitar cables.
Do coily cables make a difference to sound? Yes.
Were the coils used way back in the day built pretty bad? Yes.
Are coiled cables now built much better? Kind of.
Does the sound of a curly cable roll off the highs? Yes.
Are the modern-day ones better? Yes and no.
When Voltage launched, a decision was made for our first product release. I always loved the way these cables looked and the subculture surrounding them — vintage tones, fashion, the vibe in general of what they evoked.
I’d used them for years previous to starting Voltage, but found problems with reliability and the sound from cheap/mid-range brands — even with the “premium” built ones I’d purchased from our American friends over the pond.
After speaking to a bunch of reputable guitar stores in the Voltage MI dealer network, and a number of guitarists around the globe, one thing was for sure: I was not alone, and the problems I encountered were the general consensus of the coiled cables on the market at that time.
“They failed, sounded bad, not the colours I want — and again, they fail.”
It was decided: the pursuit of making the best coiled guitar cable product range was what we were going to launch with as a new company, and I’m very glad we did.
That idea back in early 2019 has now formed into a full range called the Voltage Vintage Coils® — seven colors, one exclusive color for Chicago Music Exchange (Chicago Cream), and a patent-pending innovation designed to actually stop the problem most guitarists complained to us about: coil cable reliability and failure.
Voltage Vintage Coils are now available in over 40 retailers internationally.
The Must Haves ↓
1. Low Capacitance: Whats really going on?
What we established and wanted to nail first in our pursuit of making the best coiled cable is the capacitance of our cables and overall sound.
Lower pF/ft (picofarads per foot) = better treble response.
Higher pF/ft = duller, muddier sound.
We believe we’ve found the sweet spot.
Some guitarists don’t notice the capacitance difference in cables, some guitarists actually don’t mind some of the highs being rolled off, and some actually seek out this unique sound due to the use with certain rigs or pickup choices.
One of our country artists, Vincent Neil Emerson, chooses to tour with our coiled cables because, one, they’re reliable, and two, the sound he gets pairing it with his Gretsch and maple-neck Telecaster is what he wants. Not too bright to take your head off but still so full and almost hi-fi, like how it fills out with a full band on stage.
Voltage Vintage Coils® use 21 AWG copper because it strikes the perfect balance. Tough enough to handle the real-world touring, but with just the right top-end frequencies. They still sound like coils, but tweaked for what we think sounds the best and stays reliable.
Voltage Vintage Coils measure 25–39 pF/ft depending on the stretch of the cable.
2. Reliability: Guitar cables need corrosion protection.
Most coiled cables — and instrument cables in general — don’t fail because they were yanked too hard. They fail because of corrosion, poor soldering, and sub-par protection methods at the most critical points.
We’ve seen corrosion affect output sockets, strings, potentiometers, and the internal wiring of amplifiers. I’m sure you’ve seen it too.
We’ve even seen it ruin some of our bulk cable stock in the warehouse.
It’s a real problem.
The closer I looked at this, we started poking around old failed guitar cables (not ours) given to us and found that this was one of — if not the — main points of failure.
In this photo, you can see the guitar cable is well rusted/ corroded and the green colouring is the oxidation now eating away at the copper.
Methods like “heat shrink” and “non-hermetic dielectric coatings” don’t stop corrosion.
Even if there’s good soldering, the chemical reaction — corrosion — still, over time, damages your guitar cables. It creeps up into the internals, ruining the whole integrity of the cable. This age-old problem has been happening for a long time.
Over time, exposure to moisture, humidity, and oxidation causes serious issues:
• Crackling, signal loss, and random dropouts or muddy tone
• Corroded solder joints = weaker structural connections
• Total cable failure, even if it looks fine on the outside
3. Innovation: ISO-COAT® and why curly's get it first!
OK — so what have we done about this at Voltage Cable Co.? and how have we implemented a solution for our coiled guitar cables to address the issue of failure so many guitarists told us about?
We spent the last 4 years developing and testing a process we now apply to all of our Voltage Vintage Coils. It's called ISO-COAT® and what it does is hermetically seal the most critical points exposed of the guitar cable assembly.
This hermetic seal locks out corrosion, oxidation and atmospheric attack. If your coiled cable has ISO-COAT®, these nasty chemical reactions can't wreck your signal or guitar cable.
What started as local demand to build the best coiled cables back in 2019, has ended up in my small but mighty Australian company developing, testing and applying for a patent to protect our invention and most of all to protect guitar cables!
Over kill just for a curly cable?
No way. thats not how we roll down under. We go all the way.
4. The Technicals & Specifics:
Using the best components and skilled labour is also how you make a killer, reliable guitar cable. Quality control is also a major thing here and we have a detailed system of Q/C testing to ensure every cable leaving the Sydney warehouse is as described on the box.
Now that you've done a bunch of heavy reading, heres a specs list for our Voltage Vintage Coils® and a few more reasons why they're the best coiled guitar cables available today:
• Australian Handmade – No mass production. Premium build quality. Every cable is handmade by technical engineers with over 45 years of experience in valve amp manufacturing.
• ISO-COAT® Lifetime Seal – Patent-pending, first-of-its-kind hermetic seal to prevent corrosion, oxidation, cable failure, and sonic degradation.
• Low Capacitance – 21 AWG copper strikes the perfect balance between toughness and top end. 25–39 pF/ft depending on stretch.
• Right-Angle Plugs – Custom plug configurations: right-angle/right-angle as well as extended “Tele” style plugs.
• Silver Solder – Silver solder is important for signal clarity and soldering strength. We use Quad Eutectic silver solder, the highest grade available for clean, reliable connections.
• Rigorous Quality Control – Five stages of quality control testing during manufacturing, with two audio tests before each cable is shipped from our Sydney workshop.
• Cable Lengths 25/30 ft – Best for both stage and studio use, right out of the box.
• Enhanced Recoil Memory – A thick outer jacket and materials preserve coil memory, ensuring your coil stays intact and performs year after year.
• Vintage Aesthetic – Nostalgic, vintage-inspired 60s automotive colors. Improved coil internal design, increasing durability compared to any other brand on the market.
See The Voltage Vintage Coils® in Action ⚡️ ↓
Check out how these monster players Michael Lemmo from Normans Rare Guitars and Jedd Hughes pull tasty tones with our Voltage Vintage Coils
Blog image credit — @lostincrystalcanyons (Robert Hart)
