Oscar Sound Tech TL-40 and Sennheiser G3 100 transmitter - problem

[sonidista]

Hey there, I am having a problem with my new TL-40 lav from OST. When connected to my G3 tx the sound cuts in and out. Is anybody else using that combination? Trying to find out if this is just a bad combination or if this is just my lav/tx.
thanks for your help.

[Petros Kolyvas]

Hi there,

There's a thread on JWSound following this issue:
http://jwsound.net/SMF/index.php?topic=7880
(starts about 2/3rds of the way down with yours truly)

Have you contacted OST? They were very quick to take the mics back for repair, and very forthcoming with time and effort in getting the problem solved.

Having said that, there's a good chance it's not just your lav and something can be fixed by rewiring the connector.

In my case, if I unlocked the barrel connector, the sound would stop cutting, but then of course the lav itself was unsecured. Even more oddly, the issue isn't consistent across the couple of G3 tx units I have.

I do think it's worth it to give OST an opportunity to get to the bottom of this. The mics sound quite good; doubly so when you take into account the low price.

[gpforet]

I'm using the OST 801s with my G3s and have not had any problems at all. I think the first thing to check is whether it is the mic cutting in and out, or the wireless link. If you ordered the OST for your G3, my guess is it is not compatibility, altough you could have a bad mic or cable but my guess is it's a transmitter/reciever issue. You could do a quick test.

Connect your mic to the transmitter. Turn on a radio or CD player and place the mic next to it. Adjust the sensitivity on the transmitter until you're getting a nice meter deflection. Put your camera on a tripod a run about an hour of video on the meter (you'll need to put a light on, because the backlight on the g3 goes out after a minute or two). You can then review the video and see if the meter drops out while listening to the scratch track from the camera. If your camera allows you to have one input on the internal mic, and the other input from an external source, you can go one step further and connect the G3 receiver to the second input, and when listening to the camera audio, if you hear one channel go out, your can quickly look at your video and see if the transmitter's meter is still deflecting. You'll have your answer in 2 hours.

Hey there, I am having a problem with my new TL-40 lav from OST. When connected to my G3 tx the sound cuts in and out. Is anybody else using that combination? Trying to find out if this is just a bad combination or if this is just my lav/tx.
thanks for your help.

[sonidista]

hey,
Petros, the guy posting about this issue on jwsound is me too

yes, OST are very good for service and offered to send me another lav to try and find out where the problem is. They're absolutely great. Just wanted to hear from others if there were similar issues, as I have this suspicion that there is something wrong with some G3 Tx jacks, but that only occurs with some connectors, not all of them. The reason I posted here was to gather some reports about G3/OST combination.

gpforet, the Tx/Rx are fine, they work perfectly with the Sennheiser kit mic and did so with a Rode Lavalier I used before.

Thus my first conclusion was that the issue must be on the lav/plug side. However, the same lav worked perfectly when pluggd into my Olympus LS-5 recorder. Follow me? What the flip do I make of this? Logic is failing me here...

[sonidista]

Even more oddly, the issue isn't consistent across the couple of G3 tx units I have.

Here's what I'm talking about! Must be some G3 jacks are different than others, but in such a minor fashion that original Sennheiser connectors will still work... I am starting to feel like Sherlock Holmes...

At the risk of causing even more confusion, I will say that there is a known issue with Rode's Lavalier connector Micon-1 that couldn't be locked on *some* G3s which caused Rode to revise the Micon-1. It's all very mysterious to me.

[John Willett]

The G3 uses a 3-pole lockable mini-jack.

The mic. is connected to tip and sleeve only - the ring is the line input.

But, on the G3, the ring has to be shorted to screen to switch the transmitter.

On the old G1 and G2, the ring could be left unconnected; but on the G3 it has to be shorted to screen.

I think this may be the problem - either this, or you are not using a lockable jack plug.

I hope this helps.