Topic: Is it possible to blow both a mic capsule and active cable at the same time?

[naylor]

Hey, all.  Here's my problem, which I'm hoping somebody can shed some light on.  I run AKG 391s with active cables for stealth.  I put together this rig a short while back, and have run it twice so far.  The first time, I had no problems; everything ran perfectly fine.  Last night was the second time I used the mics, and I noticed that only my right channel was feeding a signal to my deck when I started recording.  After spending quite a while in a bathroom stall after this discovery, I swapped channels with every piece of gear in the signal path, and the good channel would move from one side to the other as I did this.  Once I got down to the mic caps, however, I switched these and then got no signal in either channel.  Switch them back, one of the channels works again.  This leads to me believe that I have both a bad cap and a bad active on the one side ... is this possible?  I didn't do anything out of the ordinary with the setup between my first and second shows, other than tape the active cables together to make them more managable.  The sound wasn't even close to loud enough to have done any damage at either of the two shows either.  I purchased the mics used, but the active cables were brand new.  Any thoughts on what the problem might be and what may have caused it?  Thanks.

Eric

[Sanjay]

OK, this is the third person to blow an active cable for the 300 series in a month, first myself, second musicsherlock and then you.  All new or refurbished active cables.  I am having serious second thoughts about their build quality and keeping them.

To help you in your problem, look at the bayonet connectors, there are two versions an old and new, and although they are supposed to be compatable I had a capsule and a body a few years back that just were not.  If you have old mics then you might have a mismatched pair. So one cable may only work with another.   If you want I can post a pdf with a diagram of the bayonet connector differences. 

damn these cables are so damn delicate.

If you need to borrow a set of my caps to further test you are more than welcome to them.

[naylor]

Wow, at least it's nice to know I'm not going crazy.  The mics I have were purchased separate from one another.  One of them is definitely pretty old, the other one is newer, but I don't know how new.  So can we assume that it's the old-style mic caps that are blowing these cables?  It's definitely the older of my two caps that is on the channel that won't work now.  And is there any way to fix the active cable at this point?  If I could fix it, I'd just buy a new cap that's compatible with it.  Please post that pdf diagram if you don't mind, and I'll check out my connectors.  Thanks a ton for the info. 

Eric

[Sanjay]

http://www.cs.uwaterloo.ca/~mannr/AKG

Thats where I got the Pdf from, it discusses the bayonet differences on one of the three.

I don't think its the old style ones that are blowing the connectors since the old/new pair was a different one I had years ago with no actives.  I just know the bodies and caps for that pair were not interchangable like they should have been.

I think the cables are blown easily by the slightest tug on the cables.  I have taken them apart and the mics are attached soley by the solder connections and not by any strain release that I could tell, at least on the bayonet end. 

I think your best bet is to send it to AKG USA for a checkup, my repair for mine which I badly tried to fix myself was $69, if yours is new there will be a 1 year warrenty on it, mine was refurbished.

-sanjay