Snake cable, all grounds work, all others don't?

[3tuxedo]

Hey guys, i know you hear this a lot but i'm pretty new to this forum so i'm looking to learn a lot. I acquired a looooong snake cable from my school because they got a new one and they said the old one wasn't working. My father and i saw that a lot of the connections weren't made so we cut all the wires back on either end, and before we soldered the wires back on the sockets, i decided to take a volt meter to it, just to make sure the wires themselves weren't harmed. to my surprise only a few channels had all 3 wires working correctly, i think maybe 2. But the weirdest thing in the world is going on, that, if the entire cable was broken somewhere, probably shouldn't be happening, EVERY SINGLE ground wire for every single channel is totally fine. even if the others aren't. that is just confusing. this would be an expensive piece of equipment if i can get it working, and crucial too, so does anyone have any thoughts?

 

[witzendoz]

The ground wire has contact with the shield, or uses the shield as the ground in some cables. The + and - cables are smaller in cross-section and are more likely to be damaged. If this many cores are damaged the cable has been damaged big time and it's probably in one place along the cable. Have a close look on the cable and see if you can see where the cable has been crushed or had something sharp placed on it, that will be where the break is.

Another way of finding the break is to have the meter connected and to go along the cable and twist and flex it every few inches and see if the connection comes and goes. If you find the there is a common break, you can cut the cable there and make a shorter snake, the remaining cable if long enough can be reused for something else.

Alan.

 

[3tuxedo]

Hm i did checked the cable, there are a few places where there are indentations in the rubber, but it doesn't seem deep enough to cut the wires, would it be worth it to cut open the rubber holding all the individual wires together so i can examine the actual wires? I can't think of a different way to go about this.

 

[moresound]

9 times out of 10 the problem will be within the first 3 feet of either end of the cable.
I've had good luck with lopping off 3 feet on either end then reattaching the sockets.