iPhone 3GS Frankenphones

My wife's ears are too small for the hockey puck earphones that the new iPhone comes with, but she wanted their functionality, just with in-ear earbuds. So I cut the heads off some Skullcandy earbuds and spliced them onto the iPhone earphone wires.

Tools required:

Something sharp. I used the knife on my multitool, but scissors or wirecutters would work just fine.
Something hot. A soldering iron or heatgun might work, but I used a torch-style butane lighter.

Step 1 Decapitate in-ear earbuds

Just what it sounds like. Cut the heads off about an inch and a half from the buds. Leave at least half an inch of the outer insulation, and at least 3/4 of an inch of the inner wires. You'll be able to tell the right earbud from the left by the color of the wires, which will probably match that of the Apple wires.

Comments

[alloqba]

Nice work! But from my experience without soldering you are loosing a lot of volume and sound clarity, maybe try to solder the wires and insulate them again? Or is it just fine for you?

[baneat]

I would definitely solder. I fins it strange someone who actually owned heatshrink tubing wouldn't solder it.

[litcritter]

alloqba, I think you're right. They failed after about a week. I ended up taking the skull candy earbuds apart, and soldering the wires directly to the speakers with no splices. It was a bit more work, but it seems to work better, and it certainly has a cleaner look.

[rosestoney]

ya i definitely think doing it this way is better, i was thinking about doing it with the riot rastas instead of the ink'd cuz in my opinion and use they sound a lot better. but definitively has a cleaner look.

[cx420ns]

it would have been easier (and probably cheaper) just to buy a 3.5mm adapter for using the skullcandies. iphones dont come with them? other phones do, i know sony erricson puts it in the box

[litcritter]

It's not about the jack, it's about the controls the iphone earbuds have on the wire.