I destroyed a classic mic today!

R

rob aylestone

Moderator
I've quite a few nice old mics and today got out the AKG D222 to use and I wondered if it could do with a clean. So I looked for the way in, and there was a suspicious joint in the body, so I twisted. Nothing happened, I twisted again, but harder and the entire body shattered. Not metal but a hard plastic, and it just fragmented into about a dozen pieces. They don't unscrew.
 
Yes - it appears that you remove the end windshield and pull it out, but I fear finding a new tube will be tough - unless I can find a damaged one, I suppose. It's very annoying to have wrecked it, when it's not really had that much use. I tried ebay but they want near £200, and I don't want one that much! It looked like it unscrewed. Clearly, I should have checked!!
 
Sometimes it's fun to just have at it, as in your case. Seeing a seam in a plastic housing - it could have been welded sonically making it impossible to separate without destroying.
 
rob aylestone said:
Yes - it appears that you remove the end windshield and pull it out, but I fear finding a new tube will be tough - unless I can find a damaged one, I suppose. It's very annoying to have wrecked it, when it's not really had that much use. I tried ebay but they want near £200, and I don't want one that much! It looked like it unscrewed. Clearly, I should have checked!!
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May I suggest an import mic that you can transfer the parts into?
 
It wouldn't be a vintage mic though, would it? Even worse, the tone of these mics is very bland by today's preferences, so that's why I kept it but didn't use it. If I can find a duff one for say, £50 - I think that about the limit for it. Great for speech, and instruments with no bottom end - but given a choice, it's a rather boring mic!
 
I know your pro so you probably would not want it to look like you retrofitted it with an different case / housing. Looking how it was designed I know if all I wanted was to make it usable and not worried about the aesthetics I could Tom Fixin it with some PVC Pipe to make it usable for it's purpose...but it would not look at all like the original ..just saying...
 
I think I’m going to glue all the pieces together and then fill and sand it and the re spray black. It will then go back in the collection. I’ll probably have lots of ridges and need to sand the highs and fill the missing bits but we’ll see!
 

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I also kept the black dust that I got sanding and mixed that with the bicarb - that's a great tip, the superglue sets rock hard straight away. However I now have black superglue on my fingers!
 
superglue...no matter how hard I tried, it always ended up on my fingers, countertop and other misc things.
but it is what it is, maybe the best if used correctly.

never had a mic break up like that, strange. plastic body? .

.per AKG "special plastic compound"...with non-reflective black finish.
-10 c to + 60 c...

interesting history of that mic. D222
 

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It’s very tough. One of the loose chips is totally unbendy, and when I twisted the tube it was like twisting metal, then suddenly is just shattered. Do you remember that toffee we had years ago that was rock hard. when cold it was impossible to break, and you had to break the block up with a hammer? Just like that, but plastic. On the superglue front, fingers and worktops 100%. It sands well.
 
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