OT: Headphone jack gets only mono

[Robert Green]

If I understand correctly, it could even be a problem with the size changing adapter that sits between the stereo's full-sized headphone jack and the smaller headphone mini-plug.

[micky]

Have you connected speakers to the speaker connection in back of the stereo. Do both channels still work. With some headphone jacks, plugging in the jack turns off the speakers, with others it doesn't. So if nothing from the speakers, turn down the volume and unplug the headphones.

(as an aside if unplugg>

You don't need to unscrew a cover on the plug. Just touch the meter probes to right spots on the plug itself and you can read what it says. If you have the headphones on, you should be able to hear a click when you touch the second probe to its intended spot.

It doesnt' matter which probe goes to which place.

Like none says, one probe to the tip of the plug and one to the long sleeve closest to the handle and the meter should read, I'll take J's word for it, 50 ohms. You should also hear a click in your left ear.

Then the middle metal part, called the ring, and the sleeve, the part closest to the handled and it should be the same number of ohms as you got in the first step. Plus a click in your right ear.

And you can also measure from the tip to the ring, which will really be in one earphone, down to the common connector (the sleeve) and back to the other earphone and back to the meter. So that should be the sum of the first two readings.

True, you can't measure this if you can't unscrew the cap, but I doubt it is zero since one channel works. It's probably an open, not a short.

But getting one on, if there is a face plate, might be a problem. If it's the jack, maybe the physical problem can be identified and the jack parts bent to make it work.

Is this a phone plug, 1/4" diameter at the sleeve, or something smaller.

[micky]

Yes.

You could try using a non-conductive stick, like the handle of an artists thin paint brush, to push the tangs in, closer to the plug, while wearing the headphones. If you get good sound where there was none, or even static maybe, you've found a tang that needs bending. Take the plug out to bend, and be sure you bend in the right direction. Not a jack but I bent something in the wrong direction once and hard even to get it back where it was, let alone farther. .

[micky]

There is one of those? Oh, yeah, he does say adapter.

If that's for size-chaning and it probably is, he should borrow a pair of headphones with the large plug and see how they work, and he should take his headphones with the small plug and plug them in somewhere else and see how they work.

And he should do the same thing USING the adpater. Get another pair of miniphones -- qualitiy doesn't matter. you can buy a pair for a dollar at the dollar store, all that matters if ithere is sound (okay some of them might not even have sound, so check if it works in your mp3 player) and plug that into the adapter into the HK amplifier.

And plug the currently used headphones, with the adapter, into some other thing's jack that it fits and see if that works.

Dont' try using the headphones in something that wants a microphone, like a cell phone. Maybe you can do it that way but it will get too confusing.

(Actually these are the first things OP should do. Someone else mentioned them, i hope. )

[micky]

Not yet. See my second post, and maybe my first one.

What about all your friends at the collider.

[micky]

I love WD-40. I even think it's a lubricant. But I woudlnt' use it for this.

I agree though. Liquid before sandpaper. Has sandpaper ever worked?

[micky]

Are these earbuds?

or big enough to cover your ears?

My first post was about testing headphones. But I forgot to say, and it's better here, that if HB doesn't have a voltmeter, mulimeter whatever, the easiest way to test the headphones is with a battery and a battery holder maybe and a wire or two.

I usually use the battery in the meter, which is usually 1.5 volts

Is there any chance a 9v battery will burn out the headphones, if one just taps the connector to the headphone? I don't have any real experience with earbuds.

If a 9volt battery is thought to be dangerous to the earbud, he can take a 1.5 volt battery, get someone to hold one end of two wires to each end of the battery, and he can hold the other end to the Tip and Sleeve and then to the Ring and Sleeve, and he should hear clicks in each ear, one ear at a time.

[micky]

Don't be too hard on the young lad.

I too read that sentence, but since you didn't go into detail, I pretty much ignored it. So some of what I've written may be superfluous.

let me get this straight, however. When you use the same headphones and the same size adapter insomething else with a 1/4" jack, they work?

And when you use a different set of headphones with a 1/4" plug in stereo, they don't work?

If not those tests, what were the tests most similar to those that you did?

[micky]

IIUC, to get the good sound you used to have, you were already using the the same jacks that you'll be using with the wireless headphones he's suggested.

The problem with the tv's sound is almost surely the speakers themselves and not the electronics or the jacks.

One can take a 2" by 3" by 1" transistor radio from the 1960's and plug in a better speaker and it will sound pretty good. Do you remember the cardboard tubular speakers. 12" wide by 2" in diameter. Sounded good.

Right now in my bathroom I have a 14" color tv with a two speakers from one 1930's record player. One's bigger than the other. I've been using them in two diferent bathrooms for hte last 40 years. They sound great, but the speaker in the tv by itself sounds like Donald Duck. .

Small speakers never sound very good. And thin speakers, shallow ones afaik never sound good either, but maybe the ones that come with thin screen tv's are a litltle better. I didnt' even consider using the speakers built into my thin screen monitor.

[None]

The jack is the socket, or hole, on the receiver. The plug is the stick at the end of the headphone wire. The plug goes into the jack.

[Higgs Boson]

Thanks Greg -

Some poster(s) sounded a little iffy about WD40. I have no basis for judgment either way.

Just found an old tube of Memorex head cleaner. Label reads:

"This solution is specially formulated for use with the non-abrasive tape in the Memorex Head Cleaner. It will clean magnetic tape heads, pinch roller guides and capstans and will not deform robber parts. Contains Isopropyl Alcohol."

Is that something I could try in the jack?

TIA

HB

[Higgs Boson]

Have tried with 2 different "big enough to cover ears", 1 on-ear, and 1 ear bud. Nothing delivered stereo.

Yes, sorry, I know virtually nothing about audio so other NG members have s traightened me out on terminology. Jack is hole in stereo. Plug is what y ou put in.

I'm pretty sure it's jack, which worked at first, then degraded. You hi-te ch experts are suggesting ways of "cleaning" it. If that doesn't do it, as I understand, it may have been damaged or deformed by my not fastening it down so it didn't bump against the walls of jack as the cord to headphones moved.

NOT USING EARBUDS. USING STUDIO-TYPE CLOSED HEADPHONES or ON-EAR HEADPHONE S.

Interesting!!!! So if I DON'T hear a click, does that mean the problem is at one of the points you list?

HB

[gregz]

I have used sandpaper. Various grades and devices, burnishing tools, on relay contacts.

I have sat and cleaned silver plated contacts on large rotary switches with tarnX with q tip. They started out all black. Cleans well. Wasn't even my decision.

I had a lot of problems with sand getting into electronics in the desert. Very fine stuff.

Greg

[gregz]

Most meters will click headphones, also dynamic microphones. Its not likely a 9 volt meter is without series resistance, but just use X10 scale.

I once blew out an expensive photodiode with a Tripplet on X1 scale.

Greg

[gregz]

I actually had one of those 60's ? I didn't think much of it.

Greg

[gregz]

Right, but it of course evaporates fast, and will not necessarily stay covering entire plug . Do it several times dip, in out.

Greg

[Stormin Mormon]

You might be able to find a neighbor or teen ager on the street who will let you try your headphones in someone else's audio device.

[micky]

Relay contacts, sure. They experience arcing, and deposits, and even maybe microscopic transfer of metal from one point to the next one.

They get much harder use than any part of a plug and jack, except maybe if one is in the desert. .

Tarnx sounds good. I'll remember that.

I'll bet.

[micky]

I was asking about a 9 volt battery alone, no meter.

I often use a 1.5 volt battery alone to hear the click, and i know 1.5 volts won't burn out anything in my house (since I'm not some high tech nano-lab)

But since he's using bigger speakers, not earbuds, I don't think a 9-v battery Alone, no series resistor, will hurt it. Just a louder click. Still I live alone and like 9volt because there are thing on it to attach the alligator clips and wires. He must have someone to hold them to a 1.5 volt battery AA, or AAA, and then he be sure there is no damage from that .

Enough reason for caution.

[micky]

First I should say that we're not going in a very organized manner, I think, and that's probably due to the nature of Usenet, where everyone answers at once, but that should merely slow things down. It also probably increases the chance of success.

Surely if you hear a click in one ear but not in the other, either you're doing something wrong or there is something wrong with the headphones.

Related to my introduction at the top: I thought you had tested the earphones on some other device and both sides worked.

When I read your first post, I thought maybe you had just rearranged things without a) fiinding other headphones or b) finding another device to plug in the headphones you wanted to use, but now I'm pretty sure you did a, but not so sure you did b. You may have other devices with a headphone jack. After years of ignoring the jack it's easy to forget its there. Or your friends do.