Solder a copper grounding tab onto cable 7 on 3gs dock replacement?

History: Old 3gs with ballooning battery from my brother. Replaced battery. Mic and Home button not working. Activated on screen home button as workaround. Not long after, actual home button began working, but slow response. Mic not working on phone calls (I hear them, they can't hear me) or for voice memo.

Ordered replacement dock and installed. Snagged grounding tab and it popped off, went flying and can't find it. Installed dock anyway and did copper wire tucked between cable 7 contact point where tab was (first verifying on the old dock cable 7 these points were electrically common, as the tab I think is glued to cable at one point, then soldered or micro tack welded at adjacent point. )

Though grounding was achieved(?), I can only get one bar signal and no 3G even when near cell sites.

AND THE MICROPHONE STILL DOESN'T WORK! (I did try several of the fixes re the mic not working to no avail. Home button still working).

Switched back to the old dock. Get 3 bars and decent 3G connectivity and data rates. Back and forth with the dock several times, this is consistent, new dock, one bar, old dock, 3+ bars.

NOTE: Electronics, especially RF circuits, can be very sensitive to adequate grounding, ground loops, fruit loops w/ milk spatter , etc. I'm wondering if I can take some hard worked copper (not soft annealed), form into spring tab modeled after the gold plated one on the old, working dock, pre-tin and barely touch-solder on to the replacement dock cable 7 (as I can't return the dock now!) and see if the signal improves, and quite possibly the mic start working???

I could probably find some gold plated copper somewhere on a PCB or from a neighborhood TV repair shop.... no, wait, that's only when I'm time travelling....

I've tried leaving the case open about 15 degrees and monkeying with the copper I squeezed in there between the metal ring of the case and cable 7 where the solder is point for the clip is exposed, and also tried aluminum foil diagnostically for possibly better conformity and less at least temporarily surface contact resistance (though Al oxidation would be an eventual problem).

It doesn't seem to make any difference in the signal strength. I forgot to test the mic. No, I don't do open heart surgery on people, just iPhones, airborne lasers and charged particle beam weapons.

Another detail, when I tap the screen in the voice memo mode over the mic, the needle jumps. Is that just an indication that the application is running??, as tapping anywhere else on the screen or near the mics gets no response and no recording or phone call has ever indicated the mic works under other circumstances.

I'm not that concerned as I only use the phone for remote data access via bluetooth AP hotspot tethering to my laptop. It's just a pain to swap my vintage cell phone SIM card back and forth when I could be using the iPhone. I'll eventually get a newer used iPhone from hand-me-up from my daughter who is upgrading, but I've got DTPD, a duct tape personality disorder with seat of the pants traits.

Thanks.