Microphone collection and maintenance

Anyone who has a little knowledge of studio microphones should know how a microphone of this level needs careful care and maintenance. Through the following article, I will share with you how to maintain and regularly maintain the microphone during daily use. .

(1) Maintain low humidity

Regardless of whether it is a dynamic, condenser, ribbon or microphone that looks simple in structure/cheap/hard shell inside and outside, it is recommended to keep a certain degree of low humidity, because the microphone's vibration model and components can not withstand moisture and moisture. In the long-term high humidity environment, the sound of the microphone and the circuit board will also be affected/degraded or even reimbursed.

Many people use moisture-proof storage boxes with temperature and dry humidity adjustment functions to store equipment such as microphones or cameras; but when setting the temperature in the moisture-proof box, don’t set too much and forget whether the temperature and humidity of your indoor space are There is a big difference between the drop and the inside of the box, otherwise the equipment will experience an instantaneous impact due to drastic temperature and humidity changes when it is taken out of the moisture-proof box.

Therefore, in order to protect the safety of the equipment and prolong its service life, in addition to the indoor space, it is necessary to use a dehumidifier (or central air-conditioning) to dehumidify and pay attention to the changes in temperature and humidity. You can also use a plastic bag to connect the microphone to the air slightly before using the equipment. Stop, let the microphone vibration model and the circuit board adapt to the higher external humidity and temperature difference after 5-10 minutes of standing, and then take it out for use.

If you have the opportunity to visit a recording studio, you can know the space of the recording studio, the maintenance status of the equipment and the proper performance of the microphone from whether there is a thermometer and hygrometer in the space, how to store the microphone, and the method and process of enabling the microphone. .

(2) Placement method

The studio actually conducted experiments on the vibration mode placement of a microphone, and used common placement methods to compare the storage methods of American pottery. What is better? Does it really make a difference?

From the picture below after the actual experiment, it is found that when we put the microphone's vibration mode perpendicular to the placement plane (bottom), compared to the parallel placement (top), it is obvious that the dust on the top of the two is different by several times; Part of the vibration mode of the material will have electrostatic induction phenomenon, resulting in a certain tendency to attract dust.

Affected by gravitation, all matter on the earth will fall downward, and dust in the air and microphone vibration are no exception. Flat-shaped microphones have a large contact area between the vibration model and the air perpendicular to the gravity when placed flat, so it is recommended to place a small piece of paper on the upper wall of the microphone (directly above the large-area vibration model, the paper area is the area of the vibration model) 6~9 times), to avoid letting dust fall or even be adsorbed on the diaphragm.

Because the vibration mode of the ribbon microphone is a long strip of aluminum/metal foil, the weight is much heavier than that of the common condenser microphones, and it is also relatively greatly affected by the earth's gravity. If the microphone is placed horizontally for a long time, it will cause sound. The compression-induced ribbon collapses and deviates from the original central axis, which causes long-term sound quality damage, deterioration, embrittlement, and even breakage of the fixed point of the ribbon-type vibration mold, resulting in permanent damage.

The large ribbon-style counterwinds are stored vertically, and a special method is used to control the humidity; all the microphone vibration modes in the microphone cabinet are also parallel to the vertical plane of gravity to avoid falling dust affecting the sensitivity of the microphone vibration mode And frequency response.

(3) Regular cleaning

It is not easy to clean the microphone vibration mode, because the traditional capacitive ultra-thin plastic diaphragm is usually electroplated with a thin layer of gold foil, so that the capacitive black plate and the gold foil diaphragm can induce electricity to generate the microphone signal source. Simply using ordinary cotton swabs and toilet paper to clean the diaphragm will often cause more cotton and dust to adhere to it, and the dirt and saliva on the microphone mold cannot be removed; once a little effort is applied, Either the diaphragm collapses and ruptures, or the entire piece of gold foil is scraped off, causing long-term microphone failure or obvious sound degradation. Therefore, it is not recommended for inexperienced people to perform this cleaning and maintenance action. (The diaphragm of a condenser microphone is very fragile. A slightly stronger wind can make a microphone capsule useless; even if you use the corners of the lens to gently stroke the diaphragm, it may scrape off the gold foil on the surface) As shown in the picture, you can see the gold foil scraping demonstration of American pottery. We just use a small corner of the lens cleaning paper to touch a few pieces of dust to easily create peeling gold foil.