Soldering iPhone earbuds

[Eric The Viking]

Daughter #2 managed to break open one of the earbuds on her set and break the wire.

Honestly, I'm not sure why I'm bothering, but anyway:

Does anyone have a technique for tinning the Litz wire that they use?

I can prove continuity to the plug, but I can't meaningfully tin the strands, although they were once soldered.

Is there some clever flux that gets the varnish off?

Proper Litz wire uses silk to support silver-alloy conductors, IIRC, and that is _truly_ impossible to solder (you have to crimp them really). It's also almost always much thicker cable.

I can't believe it's impossible as they were originally soldered, and with lead-free stuff to boot.

Anyone done this with success? I hate throwing repairable kit away...

E.

 

[Jonzjob]

Life is too short for things like that

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-Earphone- ... ne+earbuds

Bin them and do something you really want to do. I would and I like repairing things :mrgreen: :mrgreen:

 

[lurker]

You might want to consider the long term damage they are doing to your daughters hearing.
Buy her some proper headphones
True they don't look very cool but better than hearing aids

 

[NazNomad]

Dip it in meths, set it alight. Then you can tin it once the flames are out.

... but, as above, just bin 'em really.

 

[Eric The Viking]

You're both right: have binned the broken ones.

Littlest has had lectures from me since quite small about earbud headphones (I was once a sound engineer, after all). She is sensible and knows not to have them very loud.

@Naz - you're right - I'd quite forgotten that trick. Still binning them though, as there isn't room to do that in the earbud shell!

 

[DTR]

I never had any joy trying to solder the wires in my Sennheisers. I tried burning the varnish off but it never worked for me.

 

[Eric The Viking]

I never had any joy trying to solder the wires in my Sennheisers. I tried burning the varnish off but it never worked for me.

I've given up on mine (soldering, that is). I have 414s (low Z) and 424s (converted back to 414s, 2k/ear). If/when the small pinned plugs go, the leads are scrap. I got several replacement cords from Canford (old stock) some years back, They have 419 plugs on them, but the cable prep means putting domestic plugs on instead is much easier (although I have to phase reverse the right channel, so not all plain sailing :-( ). TBH, the biggest problem is those little plugs - one pair is really intermittent and it's the sockets. I can still find the earpads though on t'internet.

Best open-ear cans ever, even after 40 years.

E.

PS: the low impedance ones sound slightly better, but are far less useful.

 

[Racers]

I have recently got a pair of Grado SR60 which sound really nice.

Seems like a nice company as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EB75v95vLV0

Pete