Quote Originally Posted by zorro View Post
I can only guess, since I haven't done any conversation yet. I would guess that the /z/ sound between без and сдачи would be doubled, for clarity. Maybe?

Z
No, it won't, if you double it it won't sound naturally but as if you have troubles with pronuncing the words, because you'll have to make a pause between words to enunciate the "з" sound twice, and as Боб Уайтман said, "the regressive voice adjustment rule" wouldn't apply in that case. So, with a pause it's pronounced as /бес здачи/.

So what do you do to link the two words into one? Well, you would sustain the sound in situations like this. What do I mean by sustain? Well, that you'll simply pronounce the doubled sound a little bit longer than if it was just a single sound. That's how native speakers differentiate between constructions like this

сестрой vs. с сестрой
войне - в войне

and so on.

But don't make it too long, just slightly longer

Anyway, I think I'm done here. I hope this helps