Headphones lose right channel: Volume suspected

Factual Questions
1

So I was on a long bus trip today leaving school for thanksgiving break and was trying to listen to my cd player. After hearing sound out of both sides for a while, eventually the right one just went dead. I found that I could turn up the volume all the way for a second, and after a little crackling both would come back on, and I could turn the volume back down and get both channels for a couple minutes until the scene was repeated. Aside from the annoyance of having to do it, this worked fine for about 30 min to an hour…after that, if the right channel went out, turning it all the way up wouldn’t even work, but it would work for a while if I switched the bass-boost switch on and then back off.

I’ve experienced this same problem with my larger, more expensive headphones that i use for my computer. they have a volume slider thing on the cord and while sliding it a crackling noise can be heard, and at certain volumes the channels aren’t the same magnitude, so I have to keep sliding the volume up until eventually both sides are the same.

So whats the deal with this? Is my cd player defective (quite possible, as its old). What about my headphones? The ones i used for the cd player were just standard, simple “ear buds” and i checked all the connections and tried wiggling around the plugs but this didn’t do anything. Is there something wrong with the volume slider (a little box on the cord with a wheel sticking out to adjust the volume with) on my other headphones?

It’s really pissing me off, and I don’t want to have to buy a new set of headphones for my computer (they were $25 the first time around… and I’m not rolling in dough)…

Any suggestions?

2

I’ve had this problem many a time, but it’s always been due to the jack - either being dodgy or not plugged in fully etc.

3

It’s a common occurance. Most volume controls are sliding arms that make contact with a resistive substance, usually carbon. As the arm moves, it varies the amount of resistance seen by the signal. Over time, dust and oil build up on that resitive surface and is picked up by the arm during volume changes. This causes the arm to lose contact with the surface, which in turn causes the audio to cut out (or pop, or create static). The long term solution is to clean the control with some spray cleaner available at the electronics store. For a short term fix, turn the device off and adjust the volume control up and down several times to get a smooth track for the arm to ride on.