Help: Broken Wiring

[Immortal 10+ year member]

Well I was trying to get to my amp tonight (its mounted on the back of my rear seats) and I foolishly pulled down one of my seats too far compared to the other and snapped the prongs on the ends of the wiring running from the speakers to the amps (the prongs on the amp end). SIGH. My bass is still working perfectly (those wires are still working), but I have no volume from my speakers as they are now getting no power.

Are there any ways to rerout the power to the speakers temporarily, or replace the ends of the wires (the prong part) with new parts or bridge the wires at the end or ANYTHING? I cant replace the wiring myself because they run under the car to the speakers from the amp and id have to take apart the car essentially. I am at school so that is not an option.

I suppose I could go to Circuit City and have them redo one afternoon (I assume I would have to buy new wiring and pay for them to take out the old wiring and put in the new ones) but I would love to replace the ends of the wiring if possible. Are there spares available?

If you are wondering by what I mean about prongs, they are the the ends of the wire that plug into these kinds of inputs on the amp:

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htf/imgcache/2605.imgcache

Click to read more...

 

[Qbenjamin 10+ year member]

Are you talking about high level inputs?

 

[Immortal 10+ year member]

I dont know the name of the wire end. I broke off the points to the plugs that go into the usual red/yellow/white style holes, the same kind of connector you would plug into the AV jacks in your TV.

 

[bball09124 10+ year member]

I dont know the name of the wire end. I broke off the points to the plugs that go into the usual red/yellow/white style holes, the same kind of connector you would plug into the AV jacks in your TV.

they are called RCA's, but that is about all the help i can give you unfortunately. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/frown.gif.a3531fa0534503350665a1e957861287.gif

 

[DjiNN 10+ year member]

Take a pic ... maybe that will HELP US assist u better ..=)

 

[Immortal 10+ year member]

Ok here the plugs that I am talking about (Thank you bball!)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:RCA_Connector_%28photo%29.jpg

I broke a black and red RCA connector, more specifically the the prongs on the end snapped in half with the other half still stuck inside the amp. Thusly the music plays fine if I hold it up as it conducts electricity but short of taping or gluing them in place for now (which I might just try with tape since I dont have much to lose for the immediate future).

I will get a picture later today but I'm not really sure how much this will help since its just a case of a broken couple of RCAs. My question is now, can I pull off the old RCA end and stick on replacement RCA connector peices? Im going to go to radioshack.com now and see if they make something like that...

 

[budget76 10+ year member]

That'd require soldering FYI. Been there before, had the RCA break while un-plugging my amp to test another I went with my option#2 below

My suggestion #1: Check if you sub amp has any RCA outputs. If it does, pick up a cheap pair of RCA wires and run them from the output of that amp, to where the ones you broke go.

2: If #1 doesn't work, pick up a long cheap set of RCA's, pull out your Head unit, unplug old, plug in new, run under dash and over the carpet and stuff to the rear. You'll see it, but who cares, you'll have music again. Then, learn how to run one yourself and save the $75 or whatever a shop would charge to run a wire.

good luck.

 

[Immortal 10+ year member]

Ok solution 1 was the way to go BUT its only halfway fixed. Basically when the tip broke off, they got stuck inside the ports on the side of the amp. I pulled one of them out with my knife allowing me to complete the repair by rerouting the sub amp's power to the other and giving my left side speakers full power again. However the bottom peice is shorter and stuck farther in and despite all my efforts with various knives and moving the amp around to get better angles, ive dont nothing but chip the port :/

Is there ANY kind of tool I can use to poke in there and pull out the last peice? It doesnt have to be a car tool, any kind of very fine knife or spear...lol anything that will be thin enough and sharp enough to stick in there and pull out the tip.

The good news is I plan to buy another amp to replace this anyway...but I wanted to wait till the summer for that so Id like to get both sides working in the mean time.

Right now I just have a second rca plugged loosely into the broken peice giving me power to my full car again but I suspect the new rca will fall out with enough bumping from the bass or just driving in general...

 

[Immortal 10+ year member]

If I take the face plate off the amp, could I take apart the port maybe and pop out the stuck peice from the inside??

Here is a picture of the plugs with the parts stuck inside (note I got the top peice out after this picture was taken). I am currently sharpening a paper clip in a desperate attempt to stab in and pull out the lower peice that is buried in there...this is sad...sigh

http://img127.imageshack.us/img127/5565/dsc00008rp8.jpg

 

[edzy 10+ year member]

several ways come to mind. use a small drill and drill into it. This will usually grab it and pull it out. If not, after drilling a small ,shallow hole, stick a small screw in there and pull it out. Lastly use the head of a nail. put a drop of super glue on it. stick it onto the busted piece, wait, then remove. The last trick can be difficult, cause if you spill any suber glue in there, it will have to be drilled out. Also, remove the back cover off the amp and push it out from the inside.

 

[Immortal 10+ year member]

Thank you everyone for your ideas and help! I actually resolved the problem permanantly by switching the wires over to channel 3 and 4 and using them, thereby ignoring the broken channel 1 and 2 input ports. Now im bumpin again lol YAY