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Thread: Chatterbox repair

  1. #1
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    Chatterbox repair

    I've got a Chatterbox TP2 and student headset. It's been used less than a dozen times and the mic no longer works on the student headset. Has anyone repaired one of these. I took out the screws and TWO wires are no longer soldered. I can't believe how ridiculously THIN some of the wires are - the headset looks like it's designed to be disposable - so cheaply made. The super fine red wire and slightly thicker yellow wire are no longer attached. Anyone know where to find a wiring diagram or have a picture of what it should look like. I'd hate to spend another $35 just for 2 loose wires! (Yes, I will zip-tie and tape the cable to the mic if I get it fixed.

  2. #2
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    Same thing happened to me. I simply removed the back of the 'working' headset, and looked at the wires. Repairing/resoldering the broken one wasn't too difficult, but certainly tedious with those tiny wires. So far so good....one event and it has held up. They are certainly not made for the abuse of nervous anxious students.

  3. #3
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    The Chatterbox was made for little old ladies sipping tea. The headsets, connectors and wires were not made to survive HPDE use.

    I have repaired headsets before. The wires are very tiny - a bad design flaw. And those tiny wires are a PITA to work with/repair. I think Chatterbox thinks the headsets and cables (including adapters) are disposable after X uses. Then they sell you more.

    The best you can do is tie wrap the wire to the stiff mic part.





    I am hoping for a Bluetooth-based solution soon.

  4. #4
    NeilM is offline Member BMW E36 M3 Expert
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    Quote Originally Posted by lmtfi View Post
    The best you can do is tie wrap the wire to the stiff mic part.
    Even better is to use marine grade heat shrink tube, which is lined with adhesive that melts and sticks when heated. (Available from Harbor Freight.)

    Neil

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by aeronaut View Post
    Same thing happened to me. I simply removed the back of the 'working' headset, and looked at the wires. Repairing/resoldering the broken one wasn't too difficult, but certainly tedious with those tiny wires. So far so good....one event and it has held up. They are certainly not made for the abuse of nervous anxious students.
    My big concern opening the new one is that those teeny wires will break off and I'll have two broken sets! I'm going to play around and see if I can get a closed circuit somehow!

  6. #6
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    Thumbs up Fixed...for a while

    IMG_3054.JPG Ok, I found the red and yellow wire create the circuit for the microphone. I don't have a fine enough solder gun for this tiny of space, so I stripped the teeny wires using a nail clipper. A made "hooks" on both ends, hooked them together and wrapped both with a small piece of electrical tape. It works...for now...and I'll keep it on hand as a back up. Thanks for the ideas of how to avoid damage to my new set!

  7. #7
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    Par for the course with this intercom. Glad you got yours working again. I am dithering around with a DIY breakout box that will allow me to connect standard ear buds and a budget lavaliere mic to the Chatterbox amplifier, so I don't need their headset hardware any more.

  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by JBasham View Post
    Par for the course with this intercom. Glad you got yours working again. I am dithering around with a DIY breakout box that will allow me to connect standard ear buds and a budget lavaliere mic to the Chatterbox amplifier, so I don't need their headset hardware any more.
    If you get something up and working, please post pictures!

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by gridgirl View Post
    If you get something up and working, please post pictures!
    For sure, no prob.

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by JBasham View Post
    Par for the course with this intercom. Glad you got yours working again. I am dithering around with a DIY breakout box that will allow me to connect standard ear buds and a budget lavaliere mic to the Chatterbox amplifier, so I don't need their headset hardware any more.
    I finally got around to breadboarding some stuff on this.

    The new Tandem Pro headsets have TRRS tips instead of 5-pin DIN. The static mic impedance for the new headsets is a little over 1k ohms, whereas the mics on the old 5-pin DIN headsets are more like 30 ohms flat. So you can't plug a new headset into an old communicator, even though the mnfr. sells a conversion cord. The mic on the new headset will be really, really loud in the ear of the person using the old headset.

    I tried paralleling a 5k ohm potentiometer with the hot side and ground of the mic wires on the new headset. It seems to work well. I broke out the mic voltage line and the ground line, and connected the wiper end of the pot to the mic voltage line and one end of the pot resistor track to the ground line. Then I passed the mic voltage and ground signal back to the input feed on the Chatterbox. When I turn the pot knob to decrease the resistance, the pot resistance in parallel with the mic resistance drops the total impedance down to a level the old 5-pin Chatterbox can handle just fine.

    Also, I made a breakout box so I can try using a $4 lapel mic and regular earbuds to feed into the Tandem/Chatterbox intercom unit and I won't need their headsets any more. I put two 3.5mm stereo input jacks on it, one for the mic and one for the earbuds. I put a 1k pot in series with the earbuds hot signal feed over to a TRRS jack. (Ran the ground over to the TRRS jack ground, 'natch.) And I wired a 5k pot parallel to the microphone hot and ground feeds over to the TRRS jack. The Chatterbox/Tandem amp connects to the breakout box through the TRRS jack. It seems to work well. Most earbuds are in the 16-30 ohm range so they match up well with the other guy using the Chatterbox/Tandem headset. The 1K series pot lets me adjust my earbud volume independently of the other guy who is using the volume on the Chatterbox/Tandem amp. And the parallel pot on the lapel mic is only necessary if I'm connecting with a guy using an old Chatterbox headset. If he's using a new one, the impedance on cheap lapel mics seems to be about 1k ohms, same as the new Tandem Pro headset mics.

    Oh yeah, if you're trying to do this, the Tandem Pro headset pinout is Sleeve = Ground, Ring 2 = Mic , Ring 1= Ear, and Tip = Other ear. If you're using their boom mic headset instead of the helmet headset, the first ring isn't connected to anything -- it only has one ear speaker and that's on the tip.

    The headset pinout for the Chatterbox 5-pin DIN units is available via Google Images.

    I'll track test them next chance I get and I'll report back.
    Last edited by JBasham; 03-26-2018 at 10:19 AM.
    If God meant for man to motor-swap LS engines into track cars, He wouldn't have created Corvettes.

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