Above it was written: “dont worry about pos. and neg. wiring the signal that goes through headphones is ac,but +/- is traditional thinking” and doubling down “you sure have no idea,whatever the polarity there is sound within hearing frequency”.
I have submitted the above quotes to the Committee Of The Internet for consideration to be awarded Most Asinine Alleged Technical Statement Post Of The Month. The Committee thanked me for the submittal and reported it was immediately placed among the top five contenders for June 2016’s award.
Fallingsnowfy asked: “for some reason the solder did not wanted to stick to the wires” to which Armaegis correctly replied “enamel is primarily what's stopping you”. Allow me to expand on Armaegis’ answer. Early in our learning electronics we get used to the various plastic insulation covering conducting wires. First lessons in soldering include stripping off plastic insulation then soldering together resulting bare copper wires and wire to connectors. The tricky part is when we encounter the other insulation, wire enamel. Insulating conductors with enamel dates back to the earliest days of electronics. Wire enamels are highly developed as they allow us to wind transformers and other magnetic components with the conductive copper wires tightly packed together while simultaneously exhibiting very high insulation resistances. Wire enamel is typically clear and very thin so it is easy to mistake an enameled wire for bare copper. In the context of headphones another useful property of wire enamel is it reinforces the copper’s mechanical properties when one needs a cable that can be small while withstanding repeated flexing.
Solder rolls off wire enamel like rain off a freshly waxed car. To successfully solder it the enamel must be removed. For hand work the method I use is as follows:
1. Using a blade like a Xacto knife scrape the enamel off the end of the wire to be soldered. I angle the blade away from the cut direction so it scrapes the enamel while being less likely to catch and knick the underlying copper. I want to expose some of the copper but do not worry about getting all the enamel off. As when we strip plastic insulation the goal is to remove the insulation without nicking the wire, nicks create stress points that can result in wire breakage.
2. With a hot soldering iron heat the wire for 5-10 seconds. Keeping the iron on the wire slowly feed solder onto the cut end and other areas showing bare copper. Success is when the solder melts and wicks up the copper under the enamel. We call this ‘tinning’ the wire. When it is correct the enamel will melt/burn and float off the wire on top of the now solder covered copper. Remove iron and allow to cool.
3. Check solder is adhered to wire. Sometimes if the enamel is very tenacious I repeat the scrape and tin process to complete removal of the enamel.
4. Once the wire is successfully tinned it can be soldered to the other wire, contact, or lug where it is needed.
Fallingsnowfy if you still want someone local to tackle the repair I suggest looking among musical instruments, recording gear, and commercial sound dealers. On the pro-audio side broken cables are a constant reality and with the equipment less disposable perhaps they will still have a repair technician on staff.
If all else fails PM me and we can discuss if you would like to send them to me and I will see what can be done to revive them.
