female 3.5mm to dual female RCA

[Pasquale]

Hi,

I am trying to solder a female 3.5mm microphone jack to 2 RCA cables
(left and right), and I'm not sure how to wire it.

On the mic jack there is a tail and the 2 prongs (one silver and one
copper).

I have a white RCA cable (left) and red RCA cable (right). When I strip
the black shield there are copper strands and within the copper strands
there is a smaller shielded wire. The smaller wires are color coded to
correspond with the RCA jack color.

I tried soldering the copper strands of both RCA cables to the tail of
the mic jack, the small white wire to the silver prong and the small
red wire to the copper prong, which doesn't seem to work.

Can someone please explain how to wire this setup for what I need?

Thanks.

 

[loedown]

The easiest way to figure it out is like this

the 3.5 mm plug at the tip will have 3 distinct sections, seperated by
plastic between them

http://www.vandenhul.com/artpap/wiring.htm half way down the page

the two braid from the wires to the RCA plugs are connected together and
then connected to the sleeve of the 3.5 mm plug.

The thin white wire is connected to the tip of the 3.5 mm plug

The thin red wire is connected to the ring of the 3.5 mm plug

Paul

 

[loedown]

No mention of PC, just the straightforward connection

Paul

 

[Pasquale]

Thanks for the info loedown. It works. I had wired that way already, but
I guess for what I'm doing I require a pre-amp.

I'm not connecting to a PC.


loedown wrote:

No mention of PC, just the straightforward connection

Paul

 

[Pasquale]

I forgot to mention my set up was actually a female 3.5mm not a male.

Pasquale wrote:

Thanks for the info loedown. It works. I had wired that way already, but
I guess for what I'm doing I require a pre-amp.

I'm not connecting to a PC.


loedown wrote:

No mention of PC, just the straightforward connection

Paul

 

[Roger Johansson]

Pasquale <spdrweb@NOTHNXtelusplanet.net> wrote:

I forgot to mention my set up was actually a female 3.5mm not a male.

It works the same, no matter if it is a male or female.
You have connected it correctly, something else is the problem, like
lacking a preamp, as you say.


--
Roger J.

 

[Pasquale]

Thanks Roger.

I am now using a Stereo Pre-Amp and I am getting a little bit of signal
noise. Is there something you or anyone can suggest to reduce it?

Thanks.

Roger Johansson wrote:

Pasquale <spdrweb@NOTHNXtelusplanet.net> wrote:


I forgot to mention my set up was actually a female 3.5mm not a male.



It works the same, no matter if it is a male or female.
You have connected it correctly, something else is the problem, like
lacking a preamp, as you say.

 

[Roger Johansson]

Pasquale <spdrweb@NOTHNXtelusplanet.net> wrote:

I am now using a Stereo Pre-Amp and I am getting a little bit of signal
noise. Is there something you or anyone can suggest to reduce it?

You have not told us what you are trying to connect to what, you only
told us about a connector.

We need more details to be able to help you more.


--
Roger J.

 

[Pasquale]

My set up is a microphone connected to the adaptor I made with the 3.5mm
female jack and dual female RCA's into a small stereo pre-amp via an RCA
cable, out to a DV camcorder using the RCA to 3.5mm cable supplied with
the camcorder.

How can I reduce or get rid of the little bit of signal noise?


Roger Johansson wrote:

Pasquale <spdrweb@NOTHNXtelusplanet.net> wrote:


I am now using a Stereo Pre-Amp and I am getting a little bit of signal
noise. Is there something you or anyone can suggest to reduce it?



You have not told us what you are trying to connect to what, you only
told us about a connector.

We need more details to be able to help you more.

 

[Walter Harley]

"Pasquale" <spdrweb@NOTHNXtelusplanet.net> wrote in message
news:kJHBd.42865$KO5.28365@clgrps13...

I have a Universal Microphone with 1/4" jack and the adaptor to 3.5mm.

Sounds like a mono microphone, and could be the kind that doesn't need an
external DC supply voltage. So that's good.

You say "jack". Do you mean "plug"? Jacks are female, plugs are male.

Are the plugs stereo or mono?

has A/V in/out 3.5mm(?) jack. With the camera came a A/V
cable with video, and left and right RCA on one end and the 3.5mm plug on
the other. I am getting the video no problem. As for the audio, I am
getting sound, I just need it to be amplified.

That definitely sounds like a line-level input. So you do need some sort of
microphone preamp. You mentioned you were using a preamp; is it in fact a
microphone preamp? What kind? How are you connecting to it?

I put together a adaptor cable to go from the 3.5mm microphone jack to the
dual RCA ends. I think it may be from here where I am getting the
static/hum/noise. It seems that if it is held right the noise is pretty
much gone. Maybe poor solder or bad connection to the tail of the
microphone jack (ground).

The way I did the soldering was:

- RCA white inner core wire to the silver tab of the mic jack
- RCA red inner core wire to the copper tab of the mic jack
- copper wire surrounding each are both solder to the tail of the mic jack

It sounds like the "mic jack" you're describing here is the 3.5mm jack into
which you're plugging the mic plug. Or am I confused? If I'm right, it
also sounds like you're describing a stereo 3.5mm jack.

Is the mic plug mono or stereo? If you're plugging a mono plug into a
stereo jack, you will have problems - at the least, one channel will be
missing. So, it sounds to me like you may not have this wired correctly.
But it does also sound like there's a soldering problem.

Are you somewhere near a Radio Shack, or a TV repair shop or something?
This sort of problem would take about one minute to diagnose and give you
the right answer, for someone who could actually see what you're talking
about. Trying to do it in text, with inaccurate terminology and incomplete
information, is going to be slow going.

 

[Pasquale]

3 contacts

Walter Harley wrote:

"Walter Harley" <walterh@cafewalterNOSPAM.com> wrote in message
news:yMKdncr78NwiO0rcRVn-vQ@speakeasy.net...

Are the plugs stereo or mono?


In case that was unclear:

Do the plugs have three contacts (tip, ring, sleeve) or just two (tip,
sleeve)?

 

[Walter Harley]

"Pasquale" <spdrweb@NOTHNXtelusplanet.net> wrote in message
news:7EEBd.41149$Y72.19723@edtnps91...

I'll see where I can find a noise gate, any suggestions?

Also, is it true that a capacitor would reduce noise? If so, how would it
be done?

You're throwing equipment at a problem when what you need to do is
understand the problem. That almost never works, and almost always costs
more than solving the problem the right way. A noise gate would cost you
more than getting the right kind of microphone and/or preamp. And anyway,
all it will do is reduce the noise when there is no signal; it will not do
anything about the situation when there is a signal. And no, a capacitor
will not reduce noise.

You still have not adequately described the problem you have. In
particular, please answer ALL of the following questions:

What is the microphone you are using?
What kind of connector does it have?
Do you have any reason to believe that it is intended as a general-purpose
microphone, or is it intended to mate with some particular piece of
equipment (that is, did it come as an accessory to some other piece of audio
gear such as a tape recorder)?

What is the camcorder you are using?
What audio inputs does it have? (It might have more than one - for
instance, it might have both line inputs and an auxiliary mic input.)
What kind of connectors does it use for its audio inputs?
Are they intended for line level or mic level signals, and if the latter, do
they provide DC supply voltage for an electret mic?


Most likely, your problem is that are trying to use an electret type mic,
which has a little preamp built into it, and it needs DC supply voltage to
be provided by whatever it's plugged into; and your camcorder inputs are
intended for line level signals rather than a mic. In this situation, a
preamp will not help unless it is intended for that sort of mic. But, based
on what you've said so far, there is no way to tell if that is actually the
problem. You need to answer the above questions and then people might be
able to help you.