By Greg Bronson, CTS-D

…Or so it seems, anyway.

Last winter, my weekend “regular activities” were interrupted to troubleshoot the loss of low frequencies from the left speaker of my home workshop stereo system.  While I tried to initially ignore it — figuring the several-year-old transplant of an Altec Lansing woofer in these particular cabinets had been “toasted” or perhaps a wire came off, that quickly proved futile.  Within a few days, repair of the speaker had become Home Maintenance Task #1. Truth be told, while being initially frustrated with “one more thing” to do, it was an irresistible challenge begging for my attention. You gotta love this stuff.
So, down comes the speaker and out comes the low frequency driver. Hmm, speaker wires from the two way cross over still firmly attached — voice coil must be toast?  Pushing gently on the cone, revealed no rubbing of the core through the magnet’s air gap (something I recalled observing oh so long ago repairing such damaged woofers).  Somewhat by accident, upon further investigation, I did a double take at the complete absence of the tiny wires that should be connecting from the woofer’s terminal strip to the back side of the speaker cone (and ultimately its voice coil winding).  It was about then I also noticed — sparing you the graphic details — much “mouse evidence” inside the cabinet itself. The only explanation: some deaf little critter ate the wires!  I found some flexible stranded wire and after completing a delicate soldering job, the old woofer was soon back in service.

Had there not been the “mouse evidence,” I’d be leading this column off with the thought that I’d potentially vaporized the woofer’s leads trying to kick out the jams when the speaker was too cold (second, but highly unlikely, possible diagnosis).  In either case there’s more to this month’s column.  You see, what happened was…

While riding public transportation, I bumped into an associate from a past project.  This Technology Manager and I had become fast friends while working on a couple medium sized projects together years hence. At that time, he had made it clear he was not “into AV,” but obviously was tech savvy. At any rate, in our catch up of going ons, he noted working on an advanced degree in a totally non-techie field.  It was clear he had a focus on pursuing what he loved doing.  I was glad for him, and a bit envious someone could be that effective in an interim career.  He asked (seeming to indicate knowing the answer as he said it) if I loved working in AV.  Afterwards, and in thinking about this month’s column, I got to wondering how many of you, AV Club readers, really love doing AV?

This is not to say that someone not passionate about AV couldn’t be effective (my friend, case in point).  In fact, a great thing about this field is the diverse skills needed, and the broad backgrounds of individuals working in AV.  One of best student workers I’ve had over the years was an English major (granted, the two tied for the number one spot were Mechanical Engineering and Architectural majors). What the English major didn’t have in tech-knowledge, or AV passion, he made up for in deductive reasoning, curiosity and people skills.  Like any career, passion for what you do helps, but this serves to remind us all it’s not necessarily a direct correlation to “AVbility.”

So while my little “friend” managed to stop his new temporary residence from shaking, he indirectly helped me reconnect (really, no pun intended) with some core skills of what I love about AV.  And, my big friend, managed to indirectly remind me it’s not just all about AV tech.

Granted, I could have immediately gotten online and ordered a replacement acoustical suspension 100 watt woofer.  Or, considering these old speakers don’t owe me a thing, I could have chucked ‘em both and pony-upped the bucks for a new pair.  In the end, making music was the goal and a couple different paths would have gotten the same end result.  But successfully avoiding spending a dime to get back to rock city was more that just financially rewarding.  It was also rewarding to apply hands on problem isolation, troubleshooting, repairing, and assembling skills (which are reciprocally applicable beyond “just” AV).

But where else would I be able to seek rodent revenge by testing the final result dialing my iPod to The Gap Band’s You Dropped a Bomb on Me?

The views expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect the views of the authors’ employer(s), past or present.

Greg Bronson, CTS-D, applies AV technologies in the development of innovative learning spaces for higher education. Greg spent the first 10 years of his career as AV technician and service manager, with the past 12+ years as an AV system designer and project manager. Bronson currently works for Cornell University and has also worked for two SUNY (State University of New York) campuses as well as a regional secondary education service depot.  Bronson is the originator of concept for Infocomm’s Dashboard for Controls and has had completed projects featured in industry publications.    You can reach Greg at gregthetechie@netscape.net