Karaoke Forums

Anyone know anything about changing a mic element?

I got a couple of wireless mics and one of them is a very old samson concert series II with a handset that has a SM58 element. Either the receiver or the transmitter is bad and I was thinking, "what if I put the SM58 mic element into another microphone?"

Is it as simple as un soldering the two wires and removing it and then resoldering it into another mic?

I like to tinker and I like to learn about how things work. I'm pretty handy too.

Now you are talking to a hacker. I have never taken a 57 all the way apart. A piezio electric crystal is usually high impedance. There are 2 wires which go to the primary of an audio transformer 2 wires out to convert the impedance to 600 ohm low impedance.

If the mic element fits, it can be shimmed, the transformer can be added also which is much smaller than the element. The 2 wires from the transformer are hooked to pins 2 & 3 of the XLR. The 58's grille plays a role in the polar pattern. Also the depth of the crystal in the mic cavity in comparison to a 58 determines the polar pattern. I am not saying it would be as good as original but would be worth experimentation.

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Ok, that's a start, thanks.

You're saying there is more to it than just the top part of the mic. that the crystal is separate from the top mic element. I guess to get to the bottom of this I'm going to have to take one of my cheap, crappy, Behringer wired mics apart to see what's inside.

I don't necessarily need to put the SM58 element into a wireless handset, it can go into a wired mic too as far as I'm concerned, I just don't want to waste it if the wireless system isn't going to be functional anymore.

I was also considering trying to find another receiver of the same frequency since I suspect it's the receiver that's probably bad, but that's just speculation. It's the SM58 element that's of interest to me in this whole odyssey.

C'mon, there's some technical folks here that know about this kind of thing, there must be.

I'm totally serious about doing this.
Someone must have changed a microphone element.
It can't be THAT hard to do?

I've done direct replacements on Shure's and Audio-Techneca's. Meaning I've replaced a faulty element capsule with a new one made for the mic. It wasn't rocket science by any means, but the wires and connections are very fragile. If you are trying to attach the element to something that it wasn't intended for it should still be fairly easy. If you want to remove everything from the barrel of a 58 you would have to remove a screw on the XLR end and carefully pull everything through the element capsule end of the Mic. There is a small transformer between the capsule and the XLR pins and I don't recall if I had to de-solder this from the element first or not. I've included a link that has a primitive schematic of what you will find inside the mic barrel. On your wireless that isn't working, the last time I had a wireless fail it was actually on the mic transmitter end. I was very patient and located the faulty resistor and replaced it and all was fine again. Hope this helps a little.
http://www.shure.com/stellent/groups/pu ... m58_ug.pdf

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

It helps a LOT. Thanks. I was hoping you would respond. You seem to know pretty much everything about audio stuff. I figured if anyone would know it would be you. How did you figure out you had a bad resistor? Was it charred or discolored in some way?

If I recall, it was just a touch darkened compared to the others, but not much. The wireless I had contained a pretty small circuit board so it wasn't that time consuming to look for the open part of the circuit. I started from the input to the output, using a regular multi meter and worked my way back until I had a reading. Once I isolated the resistor I double checked it, removed it, checked it again then read the value (which is getting hard for these old eye's) and picked up a package of the appropriate resistors. Soldered the replacement in and fired it up.

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

Just curious, where would one buy a pack of resistors like you describe? This may be beyond my skill set, but how else do you grow if you don't challenge yourself and try new things? thanks

That's usually the easy part, Rat Shacks usually have a decent selection of different value's. You read the color rings on the resistor itself to tell you what value you are looking for.
You can google up "resistor value's" and get multiple links explaining that part of it. here's just one that I use.
http://www.dannyg.com/examples/res2/resistor.htm

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

I'm going to take a short video clip to demonstrate the weird things it's doing. Would you mind taking a look at it once I put it up on Youtube?

I got the wireless system for not much money and because it had the SM58 mic cartridge, that's why I wanted it. The guy who sent it to me seemed to think it was working fine a few months ago when he put it away after he got a new EV RE2, but I don't think he bothered to check it out before he sent it.

It wasn't packed very well either. The receiver is pretty heavy and made of metal unlike many of the wireless receivers being made today. It may have taken some jarring in transit because it's so heavy and it wasn't packed well, same for the handset. I suspect it was on it's last legs before he sent it with his fingers crossed.

In the same box was a Audio Technica 200 series wireless and it works just fine.

Sure, just let me know when you have it up, I'm usually around at all kinds of different times of day when I'm not out on the road doing the rock&roll thing. do you supply the popcorn?

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

Well, sure. How much popcorn can you eat in about 2 minutes?

I just got a nifty little Flip Ultra camcorder so I'm itchin' to try it out. That might be the first video I take with it.

I'll post to this thread with a heads up when I get around to it or Ill PM you.
Again, thanks for the help.

Man, now I know how long it is since I was a real electronics technician. I used to be able to read the codes without referring to them, and recognize common values like 4.7Kohms at a glance....

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Stogie. I have tried to repair a Samson Concert series wireless mic with an element from a wired Shure mic...and as stated it will work, but in my case the battery life is muuuuuucccchhh shorter (about half or less). I use rechargeble 9volts so there is no additional expense, just inconvenience. You can make just about any capsule work if you have enough old mics hanging around for spare parts.

Good Luck
Mrmarog