Audio-technica MX-50 Lavaliere Microphone Add on by ricci07

Last crawled date: 3 years, 4 months ago

The official audio technica mic addon is expensive so I created this. I believe its actually better in some ways because you don't have to stick it onto the headphone-CAN and it be used obtain brilliant audio by using the nicama LVM3 lav mic for very cheap. I purchased the mic refurbished for £6-ish. Normally it is £17-ish. See the link below.
Because it attaches directly to the headphone cable and not the headphone you can detach it very easily for whatever reason.
The pivot arm joint requires a short (10mm) M3 hex socket bolt. To insert it into the headphone cable clamp, you need to stretch the clamp apart using a method of your choosing in order to insert the screw. This is why use must use 100% infill to avoid breaking the PLA from the stretching. Then tighten the screw until the pivot arm is brought as close as possible to the clamp. The bolt should rotate with the pivot arm. The head of the bolt stops the pivot arm from detaching. You may need to pre-tap the pivot arm hole with the screw as it is purposely undersized to allow thread creation. It may be too difficult to get the pivot arm the bite into the plastic if you don't pre-thread it. A plastic tapping screw with a sharp point may be a better solution but I have not tested that.
...For the boom...
It was designed to use a single solid-core copper conductor taken from a PVC/PVC flat 2 core and earth cable 1mm^2 to 2.5mm^2. I used a 150mm long piece which seemed to be the perfect length. I tested it with a 150mm length of 2.5mm^2 solid core cable. However this may be over-kill as it as more rigidness than is required to support the microphone at the other end. I recommend trying a 150mm length of 1.5mm^2 piece of cable.
Strip 5-10mm of insulation from each end of the conductor and insert one end into the lav microphone holder and one end into the pivot arm. Use m3 set screws, ideally, to secure the cables into place at each end. I used very short ordinary m3 hex socket bolts because I didn't have any set screws. Set screws would look better because they don't have a big unnecessary heads left visible.
The microphone holder clip was designed to hold a 6.5mm diameter nicama LVM3 lav mic (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lavalier-Microphone-Nicama-Smartphone-Recording-Lav-Mic-adapter-cable/dp/B075ZDKDY5)
If you intend to use a different diameter lav mic, you may need to modify the STL file. If you would like the original files, please message me.
Print about 3-4 mic cable clips to couple the mic wire with the 2.5mm^2 cable. You may need to modify these clips if you use a 1.0mm^2 or 1.5mm^2 conductor. Please let me know if you want these included in the original files as I haven't considered these yet.
Print about 12 or so headphone cable clips to couple the mic wire with the original audio technica cable. Again different brand headphone cable may require a different clip diameter.
Compress the headphone cable clamp with a m3 bolt and nut. One side of the clamp allows the bolt to drop through and one side with bite into the plastic. Ideally insert the bolt through the side which is doesn't bite into first
When inserting the lav mic into the mic holder be careful and "test the waters" by not pressing too hard and let the PLA flex around the mic itself. Pushing too hard will likely break the PLA. If you are uncertain it will be flex without breaking you can increase the gap with a file.
Use the increased friction pivot arm file and headphone cable clamp to obtain a stiffer response from the rotating arm. I haven't tested it, but I'm certain it will work fine.