scootermafia
MOT: Double Helix Cables
- Joined
- Nov 24, 2008
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So, I built myself a new RCA cable. A pretty easy task. I put it all together, check continuity, then put on the hot glue.
I plug it in and it sounds messed up. I check continuity and sure enough there is a little bit of resistance between signal and return in the RCA cable. What the hell.
I guess which RCA plug is the problem, and desolder the wires there. The glue is heated enough to slide the wires out. I test the RCA plug with the cable attached, no short. I test the RCA plug with some glue in it, it has a short, laughing at me like a severed head that's still alive.
I heat the glue up and start scraping it out. There's still a short. After I scrape a little more, all of a sudden, no short anymore. This is a Cardas SRCA plug. I'm also not a moron. Where the signal and return wires attach is nowhere near each other, it is by no means an even remotely delicate task to do compared to other plugs, and there's no way I could have gotten solder anywhere that could have bridged the center pin to the plug body - there's a substantial area of teflon in the center as insulation and the gap between center pin and the ground metal is aplenty. With such a huge gap you'd need a fair bit of obvious metal substance to connect the pin to the ground. I flow all the glue out with 600 degrees heat until it's nice and clean inside, and scrutinize the inside. There's no evidence of any little bits of metal trapped in the glue I scraped out. There's no evidence that any solder was even on the outside of the center pin that could have caused the short. The teflon dielectric protecting the center pin is squeaky clean. Solder crusted onto metal, overflow, does not come off easily at all and my delicate scraping out of most of the glue could not have possibly knocked something loose, but something was connecting the center pin to the return. Anyone else had a cable short mystery?
Long story short, I wasted 2 hours figuring all this out. What the hell.
I plug it in and it sounds messed up. I check continuity and sure enough there is a little bit of resistance between signal and return in the RCA cable. What the hell.
I guess which RCA plug is the problem, and desolder the wires there. The glue is heated enough to slide the wires out. I test the RCA plug with the cable attached, no short. I test the RCA plug with some glue in it, it has a short, laughing at me like a severed head that's still alive.
I heat the glue up and start scraping it out. There's still a short. After I scrape a little more, all of a sudden, no short anymore. This is a Cardas SRCA plug. I'm also not a moron. Where the signal and return wires attach is nowhere near each other, it is by no means an even remotely delicate task to do compared to other plugs, and there's no way I could have gotten solder anywhere that could have bridged the center pin to the plug body - there's a substantial area of teflon in the center as insulation and the gap between center pin and the ground metal is aplenty. With such a huge gap you'd need a fair bit of obvious metal substance to connect the pin to the ground. I flow all the glue out with 600 degrees heat until it's nice and clean inside, and scrutinize the inside. There's no evidence of any little bits of metal trapped in the glue I scraped out. There's no evidence that any solder was even on the outside of the center pin that could have caused the short. The teflon dielectric protecting the center pin is squeaky clean. Solder crusted onto metal, overflow, does not come off easily at all and my delicate scraping out of most of the glue could not have possibly knocked something loose, but something was connecting the center pin to the return. Anyone else had a cable short mystery?
Long story short, I wasted 2 hours figuring all this out. What the hell.