Hi everyone!

27 Jun 2021

I wanted to make a quick introduction...I'm Dave, the new guy on the element14 team! I'm going to be helping Randall and the content team here at element14, including the Tech Spotlights, Quizzes and more.

My degree was in Electrical Engineering, but I've spent my entire career as a software developer, mainly with Microsoft technologies (C#, ASP.NET, SQL Server).

One of my interests is in music production and recording studio equipment and I've spent a lot of my time scrounging around for broken equipment and trying to repair it. I've gotten lucky a few times and found some broken gems, but I've also picked up some lemons...case in point:

This poor little 414 I found on eBay wasn't working. I hoped it was just burned out electronics, but it looks like the capsule needs a reskin, something that's way out of my league!

I've got tons of other hobbies, including photography, filmmaking, horseback riding, and mushroom collecting.

Anyway, I am very excited to be here and looking forward to the cool projects ahead!

Thanks,

Dave

Top Comments

dychen over 4 years ago in reply to shabaz

The holes are in the capsule's backplate, which is metal and has a pattern of holes in it. You can see a photo of something similar if you scroll down at: http://www.audioimprov.com/AudioImprov/Mics/Entries/2013/2/19_K67_Capsule_Take-apart.html

Then the backplate is covered by a thin membrane (about 6-12 microns) that might be gold sputtered for conductivity. On this capsule, the membrane has been rubbed away somehow. I feel like some overzealous cleaning may have done it...but I have no idea. If the diaphragm started getting wrinkled, I think most people would've stopped right there.
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dychen over 4 years ago in reply to colporteur

Thanks! Yeah, definitely...there is so much talent here! I've learned so much already!
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shabaz over 4 years ago

Hi Dave,

Welcome to the team!
That does look unfortunate on the Mic, are the round marks piercings in it? Wonder how it happened, maybe a kid poking a needle through the grille? : (
I guess it can't do no more harm to it, I wonder if you removed that sheet, and flattened the piercings so that the material is as flat as possible, and then used something like a speck of thin nail varnish to seal each hole, if that would make it work again. Provided it's not shorting to the material behind it, it should kind of work even with the piercings though (but with poor sound quality).
I'm just speculating though, I've no idea about microphones : (
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colporteur over 4 years ago

Welcome to the E14 Community. I'm confident your skills will mesh with the network here. You may also find you are developing other skills. It is kinda hard not to around here with all the talent circulating their ideas.
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dychen over 4 years ago in reply to genebren

Thanks...I am very excited to be here! Yeah, these are rare mics, and the capsules are also rare. I may remove the capsule and send it off to an expert to fix, and just do the electronics myself.
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