It's been a while since I last went to the beach. There was always something deciding against it. Most often, that would be the weather. Recently, I bought a set of wind killers. So I went out in windy conditions to try them out. I was less than impressed with the price those things fetched.
Doing everything right, from making sure they were fluffy to releasing them a little from the front of the mics, I always got wind noise.
One day, I tried them in my windless office to find out where that wind noise came from. The wind killers did their job admirably against my breath and me blowing on them. So, where did that wind noise come from?
It turned out that the back of the mics was not as closed as I had thought. The XLR connectors were fine. But the little gap they left was most certainly not. So I went back out in reasonable conditions and covered the back of the mics with Teflon tape. The same flimsy white stuff that plumbers use to seal water pipes. And presto! No more wind noise, and the wind killers perform as expected.
Here is the sound without the Teflon:
And here with a little Teflon tape over the connectors:
Now I have the next challenge cut out for me. What can I use instead of the super-light tape that blows in the wind like nothing else? I don't want to use any sticky tape because that will leave residue and will need cleanup with chemicals that don't agree with the mics and their internals.
Perhaps some balloon parts can do the trick; I could roll them on and off the connectors without damaging anything.
I'll be back with updates for this.
Until next time…