Loose, unsoldered wire
 

While replacing the battery on my new Ibby SR 1200 (it's only 3 months old) I noticed a loose wire. I don't mean a little loose, but totally unsoldered. I guess it's one of the 3 wires coming off the output jack.



This wire goes to the left side of the terminal block you see below, next to the red wire coming from the battery's positive pole, and the white wire that goes to the passive/active switch.



What's your advice ? Should I try to solder that myself ? I have 0 soldering experience (other than my kids' toys, solders that I did and worked, but didn't look nice, nor were they done on $1000 toys). Or should I take my axe to the local luthier and have him shield that cavity while he's at it, and pay out of my nose ?

That is something you can do yourself. If you are worried about it, go pickup a 1/4 jack and a short length of cable from the local shop and do a test run to see how it all feels to you. Then go ahead and soldier that bad boy back on there. Get a package of heat-shrink that has different sizes and slide it on the wire before you do the soldier. Make sure it is just big enough to slip over the metal tang, fyi.

yep, that one is the ground wire...

That would account for some of the hum...which is the reason I mentioned the shielding in the first place. Interesting....

FYI
 

That's the OUTPUT jack on the instrument.

Corrected, thank you John. Any additional advice, though ? ;)

I'd solder it to the same lug as the other black wire on the output jack. Also, it looks like the cavity is already shielded with conductive paint, but copper would be better. I think soldering the wire should take care of the hum, though.

connecting the ground wire to the same wire from the battery is not a good idea, unless you want the battery to drain in few days.

The jack has to be a stereo type (3 lug/connectors) and be wired the appropriate way

M

You are right. The jack has 3 lugs, you just can't see the third where the wire came off in the picture.