coriolis
Active member
Hello world and a quick presentation before The Questions:
I'm an amateur musician and occasional diy'er of things like guitar effects, a modular synth - oh, and I did a battery powered mic pre too.
Not a lot of theoretical knowledge in electronics and bad at math, but willing to learn.
The subject at hand:
My old Rode NT2 (no "a") died during a recording session recently. Not sure what did it, but someone (ahem) may (or may not - I'm not sure) have reached for the phantom power switch on the back of a Mackie board - to turn phantom off - and accidentally flicked the mains power off instead.
Could a spike of sorts have found it's way through the phantom pwr and zapped the mic somehow? It seems plausible to me, but I don't quite have the knowledge to back it up.
Anyway, there is now only a very faint output signal - even with full gain on the Mackie.
The only schem I could find on the NT2 is here: http://www.users.on.net/~effect/RodeNT2tl.pdf
So, I popped it open, and immediately saw what I thought to be the culprit: a blown electrolytic, or at least it looked blown. I pull it out and solder in a new one. Just for kicks, I peeled of the plastic wrapping to get a closer look at the damaged cap...and it looked just fine. I have no means of measuring it to see if it's actually ok, but with the new cap (it's the 47uf/50V electro), the mic still didn't work, so...
Well, mic electronics is black magic to me. Looking at the schem, I can't for the life of me figure out exactly how phantom power is applied to the circuit, where it goes, which way the output signal travels, what the oscillator is for etc...
I really want to get this back to a working state, both as a matter of finances (couldn't afford even the cheapest replacement right now) and as a matter of pride, I mean...how hard can it be? :
So:
Does anyone have any pointers? Specific voltages in specific locations? Certain things that tend to go bad in these?
I'm pretty sure the capsule isn't full of dirt and crud, like in that thread about a dirty diaphragm with no output. I don't have the guts to take it out of it's mesh cage (and haven't quite figured out how it could be done either), but holding it to the light, it looks like it is squeaky clean. It's always been used with a popfilter...
If someone did cut the mains while the phantom was still on, could that wreck a mic like this? And btw: what does a very weak output from this type of mic signify - and what not?
...And I've been all over the mic metas and the search function. Actually found a similar thread (same mic) with no replies...
I'd be grateful for any help
Best, Christian
I'm an amateur musician and occasional diy'er of things like guitar effects, a modular synth - oh, and I did a battery powered mic pre too.
Not a lot of theoretical knowledge in electronics and bad at math, but willing to learn.
The subject at hand:
My old Rode NT2 (no "a") died during a recording session recently. Not sure what did it, but someone (ahem) may (or may not - I'm not sure) have reached for the phantom power switch on the back of a Mackie board - to turn phantom off - and accidentally flicked the mains power off instead.
Could a spike of sorts have found it's way through the phantom pwr and zapped the mic somehow? It seems plausible to me, but I don't quite have the knowledge to back it up.
Anyway, there is now only a very faint output signal - even with full gain on the Mackie.
The only schem I could find on the NT2 is here: http://www.users.on.net/~effect/RodeNT2tl.pdf
So, I popped it open, and immediately saw what I thought to be the culprit: a blown electrolytic, or at least it looked blown. I pull it out and solder in a new one. Just for kicks, I peeled of the plastic wrapping to get a closer look at the damaged cap...and it looked just fine. I have no means of measuring it to see if it's actually ok, but with the new cap (it's the 47uf/50V electro), the mic still didn't work, so...
Well, mic electronics is black magic to me. Looking at the schem, I can't for the life of me figure out exactly how phantom power is applied to the circuit, where it goes, which way the output signal travels, what the oscillator is for etc...
I really want to get this back to a working state, both as a matter of finances (couldn't afford even the cheapest replacement right now) and as a matter of pride, I mean...how hard can it be? :
So:
Does anyone have any pointers? Specific voltages in specific locations? Certain things that tend to go bad in these?
I'm pretty sure the capsule isn't full of dirt and crud, like in that thread about a dirty diaphragm with no output. I don't have the guts to take it out of it's mesh cage (and haven't quite figured out how it could be done either), but holding it to the light, it looks like it is squeaky clean. It's always been used with a popfilter...
If someone did cut the mains while the phantom was still on, could that wreck a mic like this? And btw: what does a very weak output from this type of mic signify - and what not?
...And I've been all over the mic metas and the search function. Actually found a similar thread (same mic) with no replies...
I'd be grateful for any help
Best, Christian
