Revive Tension From On- and Over-Ear Headphones - Customizable Fusion 360 File Attached

I love my SONY Headphones. Not because they are especial good but rather due to the moments, I have experienced with them. However, as everything gets more wrinkled with time, the plastic connector lost its tension so the force pressing the speaker on my ears was too low. I came up with this design which you may have to customize to fit your needs. Just follow the steps to do so.

This solution increased the tension in my case by the factor 3 at least. Before the improvement, they fell from my head when I moved it too fast. Now, they have just the right amount of friction to stand on my head without giving me headache after a while.

As every head has a different form, headphones get worn out differently. Proceed as described below to gauge your headphone. Sadly, I did not take before after pictures because I only thought of sharing with you guys when I was looking at done work. I will however provide pictures with the customized headphones to provide an easy step by step instruction. Just assume the pictures show your unmodified headphones.

You want to determine the size of your headphone strap. My headphones where not perfectly spherical but bowed a bit steeper at 90mm. Picture #2 shows the Fusion 360 measure. Edit as needed. Mark the points on the headphones where the caliper touches.

Lay your headphones on something straight (the packaging of my caliper). Arrange the two earlier used points on one line with the straight line. You want to determine the longest distance between the straight line and the bottom side of the headphones strap. The caliper shows 10 mm in this case. Unmodified the distance was 12mm.

Mark the point where the caliper touches the strap again. Edit measures as needed.

The thickness of my headphones is 3,5mm. Adapt the measures in Fusion 360 if needed.

Extrusion #2 determines the depth of the slit in the adapter. Change to your needs. In my case, it is 27,4.

I printed it in 0.2 mm layer height and no support.

Do not cut out too much. Definitely less than, in my case 90mm. I marked the picture with a box which shows approx. the size I’ve cut out. I smoothened the corners as well. Pushing the cut through headphones in, might be a bit hard. Heat the PLA with a lighter a bit if necessary. When everything is in place (try them on to feel the perfect spot), drill through the holes in the adapter and the headphones. Use M3 screws to fixate the headphone strap in place. When mounting, take care that you don’t twist the cables to much.