Need a way to strip a braided ceramic coated wire

[dirtjump]

I'm trying to splice the plug end of an 1/8 headphone cable onto some phones with a bad end. The plug side is fine, it had regular plastic insulated wire.

The phones, however, have the sorta twisted ceramic coated stuff with the thin cotton "String" in the middle. If it was a solid wire, some sand paper works fine, but does anyone know any way to strip these babies?

In the past I've resorted to a "separate the conductor from the string, sand, destroy the thin fragile wires, cut farther back, repeat" method.

Maybe a solvent or something?

 

[TillEulenspiegel]

Bleh............. Your trying to work with wire that is designed to streach, it's a pain in the ass. Best bet ? replace the whole cord. Second bet find an acid based flux and tinn the wire. Number 1 is better.

 

[dirtjump]

Thanks. Replacing the whole cord isn't really an option, because the it's just built in to the headphones ($30 ones that I like, so that's why I'm even bothering trying to fix 'em). I guess I'll just have to be gentle and patient with some sandpaper. It worked before when I tried to strip a similar cable, just was a bit of a pain. I'll just put up wiht it, it's probably going to stay a twist and tape job anyway. Thanks though.

 

[pike]

i wonder how the manufacturer stripped them?

 

[zevon8]

ah yes Tinsel wire.

joy

What you need to do is get a fairly fine strand of copper wire, like 32 gauge ( single strand from some 18 ar smaller stranded wire ) . then wrap this as tight as you can around a section of the wire, wrapping the string, foils of copper and all. Once this is wrapped for say 1/4" or so, solder it.
You will end up with something you can then solder to the phone plug. You need to be quick with the soldering iron, so you get ellectrical connection between the foils and the wrap before you melt/burn away all the strings.

The wire will need to be supported where it leaves the plug since the foils will easily break soldered wrap begins. Folde the braided sheild back over the cables outer jacket, and crimp to the plug with the cable restraint that is ususally used to on the cable alone.

Sometimes it is best to secure the wire to the plug first so there is little movement, stressing the connection, and breaking the foils.

Very tedious , but it will work. Normally this wire was terminated with little pins that had teeth inside, that bit through the insulation. The pins could then be terminated however you needed. Common in phone cords, etc where highly flexible but light cords are required.

Good luck!

 

[spuffock]

You could try this one, it works for litz wire but I've not tried it on "tinselwire". Pour some methylated spirit into a small metal container, say a bottle cap, and light it. carefully burn the insulation off the wire, trying not to melt the copper, and dunk the wire into the meths while still red hot. This removes copper oxide very nicely. You might have to repeat this a couple of times to get all the insulation. Good luck!