My Sennheiser HD 555 Mods - More of the "Silk Purse Project" - Page 2

yeah this was the first time i soldered anything in my life.  well the actual first time was with a playstation, but i had a friend's father do that instead.  i tried it and messed up horribly.  i was like 16 at the time, and here 10 years later i decided to try it again.  anyways, i wanted mine true dual entry because i felt that traveling through the headband makes the signal further to get to the end plug.  i think everything looks and works awesome.  i had to get a new plug though because the cheap neutrik broke after i had to re-solder it back on again.  note, if you do anything with headphones, make sure you put the heat shrinks on first, i can't stress that enough.  but yeah, all i did was wire a ground/signal wire to the drivers themselves using the long wires and then connected them to the plug.  it's really just as simple as that...all that little pcb board and jumpers are there for is to connect the right cup to the left cup and then to the wires.  by wiring right to the drivers you can bypass all that junk and have a wire going straight from the drivers to the plug.  so much easier and more efficient i think.  if you did the dual entry, im suprised you kept those in there.  did you just do a fake plug on the right earcup to look like dual entry?  im kinda confused what you did.  anyways, look for my tutorial in the upcoming days.  hopefully by the end of this week i will have it done.  it's really the simplest thing.  the hardest part to it is fishing the wires through the sleeve and putting the connections on the end plug.  a pair of helping hands really are needed for this.  it kept moving around when i tried to connect them.  i just bought a pair of helping hands and i suggest you do the same if your doing end plug terminals, they will really help.

edit- sorry for making this post 2 pages.  and also, i see you did the foam mod and you got good results.  i tried doing this with some foam and some cotton fiber filling.  i got horrible sound after doing it.  is there a special trick you need to do?  like cut around everything but the magnet?  whats the best stuff to use for this mod?  do you get good gains in bass?  is the mids/highs affected negetively in any way?

ah thanks for the clarity.  i think i will leave them how i have them, i really enjoy the sound.  but if the only thing stopping you from bypassing the pcb board was how to get them out that is funny.  they are each held in there by a drop of hot glue.  you just take a small flat-head screwdriver, go underneath them, and carefully pry them out.  i have them in a baggie in my sennheiser box along with all the other spare parts.  first i cut the wires in each driver first.  and the wire getting out of the headband was easy once you find the secret.  the secret is to unscrew those 2 little screws that hold on the earcup inside, then the cup can come completely off.  once that is off, look at the headband and there is a tiny screw and the bottom tip on each end, unscrew that and the wires are in there.  if you do it on both sides at the same time, it should release enough slack that you can just pull it out.  i was going to do a single entry because i like the look a little better, but i didnt want to drill holes in those brass pivet circles to get the new wiring in the headband.  someone did that and said they drilled too far and i just didnt want to do that, so dual side was my only option.  i really love it and it makes my sennheiser hd-555 look like a new headpone.  i think i did an excellent job on these headphones for being my first time.  i do admit though, i was very weary when i plugged them in.  i was like please dont mess anything up, and sure enough they worked awesome.  like i said im going to post in a few days on how i did everything so keep watch.  also, if anyone would like me to recable their headphones or do the soundstage mod i would be more than happy to do it.  i would only make you pay for shipping to and forth, plus maybe like 10 dollars for labor, plus the cost of all the parts.  if you want a recable, i can get wire and everything you need that will be in my tutorial for under 30 dollars.  as for the soundstage mod, i can do that for free if you pay shipping both ways.

im taking pics as i speak for everything.  not going to be as nice as when i got all the parts, but i only had one set of hands and wanted to get it done.  but it is pretty straight forward and easier than i imagined.  again the hardest part is keeping that end connector still to solder the wires onto.

So after writing what seemed to be a novel, I finally got the instructions up.  Let me know what you think!

http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/512499/re-wire-sennheiser-hd-555-headphones-and-3-5mm-plug#post_6927367