Proper headphone care?

[MikeS]

The reason I ask is that I seem to go through a lot of headphones. Most of the time they physically wear out before the sound quality goes to crap. First thing I have noticed is that sweat, at least my sweat, does not play well with headphone materials. I used to use a pair of earbuds at work, but the section of cable that came into constant contact with the back of my neck dried out the insulation and eventually caused it to crack and peel away. The surrounds on my Bose Tri-Ports disintegrated over time, eventually splitting and no longer held the foam in place.

Now I have a pair of AKG K240 headphones and I've noticed the leather surrounds (over the cushions) are not as soft as they once were, nor is there as much flexibility in the headband as there once was. I wipe the headphones down after every use, but still nothing keeps these materials from breaking down quickly.

Is there anything I should be using to condition the headphone ear surrounds? In addition, if you have any tips or tricks to increasing the longevity of your headphones, please share. Buying a pair of $100-150 headphones is not something I'm prepared to do on an annual basis.

 

[innerdreamrecords.co]

Re: Proper headphone care?

At least you don't have a phobia of a bug hiding in the recesses of your headphones and making a b-line into your ear canal like I do! LOL

 

[uOpt]

Re: Proper headphone care?

For quality headphones you can buy the soft surrounds separately, in fact they are intended to be changed every so often.

The better AKG and Beyerdynamics models should be pretty much indestructible, mine sure are.

If you buy Sennheisers then you know that you just got a very nice sounding set of cans for a low price, but that you traded in robustness.

 

[uOpt]

Re: Proper headphone care?

BTW, for leather care you should get the stuff Target sells to mess with car seat leather.

Wiping down with water or cleaner will actually make the leather break up quicker.