I am a fan of good-sounding in-ear headphones and bought a Klipsch S4i for my iPhone 3GS. I am really impressed by its quality and they are not overpriced (around 80.- € when I bought them). Last month, the connector on the headphone cable began to loosen. I tried to fix it with cyanoacrylate adhesive but a few days ago the cable finally broke (resulting in a dead left channel and microphone).

I am pretty sure this type of defect is not covered by the manufacturers guarantee (another point: I purchased them over two years ago) so I didn’t bother disassembling the connector. The first thing I did was removing the plastic cover of the connector with a utility knife.

The soldering spots are enclosed in clear plastic. I tried to remove the plastic and gently desolder the cables from the connector, but the connector broke (actually it melted). At least I was able to identify the six bundles of thin twisted wires.

I separated the colors and twisted them together into four bundles (one for each contact on the connector) and resoldered them onto another spare connector. The fixed connector lacks the ‘stylish’ finish it previously had, but the shrinkable tubing makes a good protection for the thin wires. And the complete functionality is back, including the microphone and the control buttons.