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Church Sound Maintenance: Cable Soldering In 10 Easy Steps
With a little practice and a few dollars worth of tools, you won't need to throw away those broken cables any more. You'll be able to fix them yourself
Feb. 09, 2010, by Mike Sokol & Hector La Torre
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church sound soldering
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  Church Sound, Techniques, Maintenance, Soldering

 
This article is a the second part in a series on cable maintenance for worship. For part one on cable testing click here.

One of the major causes of audio glitches and complete failure during worship services is the broken microphone cable.

Churches spend a lot of time and money each year tracking down intermittent or lost audio signals due to cable problems.

We advise sound teams to separate damaged cables from good cables immediately. That way you won’t continually use those damaged cables just when you shouldn’t. Believe us, you will forget.

Plus, treat your cables tenderly; put them away after each service and rehearsal. That way they won’t be yanked out, stepped on or run over by the grand piano.

Of course, you can always buy new cables, but that’s not the best way to be a good steward of your church’s finances. You can save time and money by learning how to solder.

Chief Instructor (of the HOW-TO Church Sound Workshops) Mike Sokol is a whiz at soldering, and below, he offers 10 easy steps to give you the courage to leap in and fire up that soldering iron.

You’ll need:
—A 25-watt soldering pencil
—A roll of .032 diameter Rosin-Core 60/40 Solder
—A pair of diagonal cutters

Everything’s available at your local electronics store (such as Radio Shack) for about $25 total. With a little practice and a few dollars worth of tools, you won’t need to throw away those broken cables any more. You’ll be able to fix them yourself.

On your first try. give yourself at least 15 minutes to solder an XLR mic cable end. Practice makes perfect…

Soldering in 10 easy steps:
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See next page for important notes.


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Comments (6) Most recent displayed first | All comments in chronological order
Posted by Ray Siegler  on  09/27/11  at  09:34 AM
Comment by brad000143 looks like SPAM.

If this is moderated, and I hope it is, Please kill this with his.

Posted by brad000143  on  09/27/11  at  08:03 AM
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Posted by Jon J  on  10/27/10  at  09:02 PM
There is one very important step left out of this how-to: place the strain relief or barrel onto the wire before soldering. I like to place it before stripping the wire, as they can be difficult to install on stripped wire. (I'll admit, I've soldered up a connection only to realize the relief/barrel/nut wasn't there. More than once.)
Posted by Ray Siegler  on  04/20/10  at  09:43 PM
Amen to the previous poster. If the newbie solders the shield into one solid chunk - you can bet he's in for some hum. Radio Shack still sells, last time I checked, a small aluminum heat sink device. Looks kind of like an odd clothespin. Put this about 1/4" from the bottom of the braid, where it meets the cable. Then tin it as above.

Also, I would say that an inch of .032 is a bit more than I use. We only need to get a solid solder joint here.

One other tip - if the shield is done correctly, it has a lot more strength than the conductors. If it is cut just 1/8" inch short, and allowed to take most of the strain, the cable will last longer. On some female connectors, the ground solder tab is already inset about 1/16th or so. If you have this kind of connector, cut them all the same length, and the existing setback will cover the relief we are after here.

Posted by Carl L  on  03/08/10  at  12:52 AM
I under this is a "quick-guide" for use with limited tools. But i'm honestly surprised by a number of things: You did not use a good stripper for cutting, you just hacked away. You did not heat shrink the ground wire as is typical (for us at least). And you didn't heat shrink the transition from conductors to solid jacketing. Yes, yes the easy way out tends to work just find, but more often that not I come to venues who have tried this method with a horrible outcome.

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