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Ok, this doesn't really have much to do with FPSC, but there are some pretty smart people here so I thought maybe someone could help. (Well it sorta has to do with FPSC cuzz i can't hear the games anymore...) Anyway it involves my headset cords...

Well first off this happened:



I won't go into details about how but it stopped working (duh...).

So i cut that part off, stripped some more wire and separated the 4 different colors of wire:



Now, is there a way I can fix this (preferably without using solder)?

And mods I'm sorry if this doesn't have much to do with FPSC, but I could really use some help and I didn't know where else to turn.

well, i'm no expert but when my adapter wire broke i just striped the wires so that the metal showed, twisted the two ends together again, and wrapped it in electrical tape and it works! yay!

won't hurt to try.

There are some really smart people down in Geek Culture. Not angry with you but that is where it should have gone. I've had answers to my hardware questions in that forum/board.

Instead of locking this maybe the mods could just move it if they are able to do that.

Yeah, I figure once the mods see this it'll be locked. I tried twisting the ends together though, and it didn't work. I suppose i could try again, but since it's a headset it may be a bit more sensitive.

I think that's going to be the issue. Those wires are made to carry a specific micro-amperage (I think that's the right term). You may get it to work, bit it'll never be the same.

Best.

Yeah, I was afriand of that. Well thanks anyway, I guess I'll have to buy ANOTHER new headset. (My god I've gone through so headsets...)

Moved to Geek Culture.

These wires are really quite fragile, especially when there's a burn, the wire basically burns out, and because often the wire is coated, re-connecting is not straightforward without solder.

I would strip the wire back until there's no damage at all, then leave about 5mm of bare wire on each - try and scrape any coating off till your left with just copper, then twist and fix securely with electrical tape. If it doesn't work after that then it may be completely burnt out.

As VanB Said, you need to carefully scrape off the colored coating on the wire until you are left with the copper (A sharp knife will do it), then twist them together.

You will find that when you start trying to scrape off the coating, the wires will start to unravel and break down. It would probably worth dabbing a bit of superglue on the end of the wire to prevent this. You will be able to scrape off more coating and get a better contact this way.

It would probably be worth getting some heat shrink tape or electrical tape to bind it all together.


If you are able to get a good amount of surface contact between the repaired wires and no short circuiting, your headset should work again.

You could also replace the entire cord starting at where it's soldered onto the headset. But uh, that'll require you to solder the new cord on

Generally there is a single ground wire and two sheathed wires for L and R channels.
If there are four wires the two grounds for L and R channel are separate starting at the two speakers and then terminate at the common terminal of the stereo EP plug(the three tiered connector at the end of the headset)

Whether or not you use solder is immaterial. To make a secure connection you have to first take the two snapped wires of the same colour and tie a standard knot as you would do with a rope, and then solder/tape the joint. This will take the stress off the soldered/taped joint.
Before you do any of this get a multimeter and set it to the impedance measurement setting to check for continuity from the EP plug to the end of the snapped wire, for all four wires because
sometimes there is a wire break inside the insulation, which is not visible. (If you don't have a multimeter, you can make a continuity tester with a standard DC battery in series with a piezo buzzer)
You can check for continuity from the broken wire to the speakers also, provided the speaker terminals are exposed. (It's important to make sure you put the two multimeter leads on the same wire ends, or you might pass a DC current through the speaker coil which can damage it.)

If there is no break anywhere all you have to do is twist together the wires of the same colour.

A quick and dirty method which we often use in the lab for continuity testing is to take both the ground wires and join them with the other two ground wires, so you eliminate any break in the
ground path.
Then take the red wire and connect it to other red. If there is any sound from any of the speakers you know that the red wire doesn't have a break, because it is highly unlikely that both
grounds have a break in them simulataneously. If there is no sound, the red wire has a break.
Do the same with the black wire. If both the L and R wires are okay, next separate the two grounds.
Now if any of the speakers stops, you know there's a break in that speaker's ground wire.

The continuity tester can also be used to test for short circuits.