mice ate the guts of my speaker

skypickle · May 29, 2022

My martin Logan Vision soundbar was working until one day after I returned from a skiing vacation, it wasnt. I opened it up and almost all the cables were chewed up (except for the cables to the outermost 4 speakers) The mice especially liked the sound deadening material. Although I could repair most of these I need help with two things:
1) I removed the 5 screws from the inside that go to the back panel, but I cannot get it off. I need to remove it to replace those wires. How?
2) There is a delicate white ribbon cable that the mice particularly enjoyed. Where can I get a new one? Not enough of it remains for me to read its specs.

From now on, those speaker ports in the back are getting plugged with foam.

JonFo · May 30, 2022

As a person who lives in the woods, and had mice chew through
1- The gas line on my old pickup truck (now has SS tubing)
2- the CAT5 cable with my telephone/DSL service
3- Some of my speaker wires in the crawl space below my HT
4- My wife's gardening projects

Your subject line caught my eye

I'd contact the factory and ask for help, as you will need a schematic and possibly some parts.
Ask if the full wiring loom for that model can be purchased, as that will be the easiest. Then they might have some spare ribbon cables, or at least provide you with the specs (guessing it's a pretty std type). Same for the foam, they might have some spares.

skypickle said:
From now on, those speaker ports in the back are getting plugged with foam

That would change the frequency response, so I'll suggest some wire mesh and glue (or screw) it on so they can't get in.

That's what we did to a drain pipe for the crawl space, put a very well secured wire mesh that keeps out the mice and other rodents, no problems since.

Brandon Hartwick · May 30, 2022

Martin Logan is really good at providing wiring diagrams for there speakers, shoot them an email. Replacing the damaged wires shouldn't be too bad, maybe ML can provide a new ribbon cable, otherwise I'd start looking around eBay as it's probably nothing special.

The back panels are usually really stuck, I wedged a razor blade in the gap between the back panel and woofer enclosure and that popped it right off with no damage.

skypickle · May 31, 2022

So far tech support says they no longer have any of the wiring harnesses. I have successfully disassembled the soundbar except I cannot get the chamber open that houses the input jacks. After removing the individual speakers, the fascia and electronics, there are 5 screws accessible that seem to hold on the back panel from the inside. Even after removing all the screws I cannot get the back panel off

skypickle · Jun 1, 2022

So far tech support says they no longer have any of the wiring harnesses. I have successfully disassembled the soundbar except I cannot get the chamber open that houses the input jacks. I bent a coat hanger, put it into one of the screw holes and pulled. The interior cover to the back panel came off with a pop. Now I can clean out all of the mouse poop.

I still need to source a ribbon cable. The wires to the front panel LCD are soldered to it but I desoldered those. The wires from the AC mains look like 18gauge but the insulation is quite thick with a big inner white core-I'm guessing PTFE. Interesting how the mice chewed right down to the bare wire. The other low voltage wires were completely chewed through. I wonder what all that wire did to THEIR guts.