Hi all, I recently purchased a rather battered but working (and very nice-sounding) D6C, but unfortunately the earphone socket is very loose - the left channel works intermittently, and the right channel is dead. The line out works perfectly, so it must be the jack. Would anyone be willing to replace the jack for me? My local hifi shop won't touch it! The beast herself: And the faulty jack: [/IMG] Henry
Yep, just a quick little in and out solder job should do the trick Then perhaps maybe a clean.... I'm a little OCD in that respect, and that sort of grime could be anything from work related dust, mold or even Toilet germs! ;-)
Well, germs can't rellly survive ex-vitro for more than a few hours, so I wouldn't really worry about that. Dust is mostly dead human skin cells, so that's moot too. Work-related dust, possibly either asbestos or radionucleides, so you're going to die from that for sure. Hopefully the organic solvent you use to clean isn't carcinogenic, like xylene or carbon tetrachloride, then all will be peachy. Do remember to re-grease/oil correctly where appropriate too. Lead solder will be fantastic for the joint refresh, however, apparently that causes systemic nerve damage, amongst other things, but has great eutectic properties. I hear Etch-a-Sketch are resonably safe for retro-fun.
Space, a vacuum, is probably the closest thing to clean you'll get. Place your D6C and headphones in a bell-jar, and evacuate. Problem solved. Apart from no sound.
I had a CD player in for repair a couple of years ago. It wasn't detecting or reading the CD at all. The owner was a heavy smoker. Once I had cleaned the sheen of brown sticky gunk off the laser lens it worked beautifully.
I'll open her up and have a look at the joints, but from the amount of movement of the actual jack, I fear it's a cracked PCB. I've just given her a thorough clean, so no more toilet germs! I've got some 60/40 lead solder in my toolbox, can't stand the lead free stuff. I wouldn't use anything else. The fumes aren't particularly enjoyable, though... Agreed, I've spent hours cleaning tobacco residue from electronics. Nasty habit. Thank you all for your suggestions. I'll have a look at the mainboard and post some pictures when I get in. Henry
I've found in the last two weeks that the green plastic is starting to crumble on my D6C. Would appear to be age-related. Mechanically it's ok but I think unless I get onto sorting it now, it will cause a lot more problems quite soon after. I think it's probable the same green-plastic part is used across most walkmans, so it may be worth cannibalising a cheapo late-issue non-worker WM-EX for parts. Long as the size and position of contacts is compatible, it could be an effective solution. G
I've managed to fix the headphone jack - two dry solder joints and a broken track. Took me 5 minutes with my soldering iron and a strand of fine ribbon cable wire. Thanks, Henry
