• Registered: 2011-02-07
  • Posts: 24

Topic: Cautionary Tale: Think before you solder.

Just thought I'd share this with some folks who may be able to commiserate. Got my new Infocast 3.5 for use in a project and happily soldered up headers to the board for use with a ribbon cable.

D'oh! How do you suppose I'll plug in the LCD now? I guess it's both upside-down and not a great idea to use straight headers. Mangled the port pretty nicely when de-soldering that one, but things still seem to be working.

http://www.crashed.net/~nebulous/keg/images/chumby_headers.jpg

Anyone have any suggestions for how to bring out those 16 pins and still use the LCD/case?

  • Registered: 2010-12-04
  • Posts: 58

Re: Cautionary Tale: Think before you solder.

Solder the header facing the other side of the board.  Then the ribbon cable will fit.  Of course then you have to trim plastic on the sound box if you want to put it back into the original case :-(

  • Registered: 2011-02-07
  • Posts: 24

Re: Cautionary Tale: Think before you solder.

Yeah, I was hoping I wouldn't have to mutilate the internals so much just to access the header, but I guess trimming some plastic isn't too terrible. Maybe an 8x2 right angle pin set could still fit without smashing into the back of the LCD. Has anyone used these pins with the original case, or does everyone just build their own enclosure? I'd love to see pictures of how other people have solved this problem. It also occurred to me that 2 cat5 cables could also break out the pads, but I fear my dear little chumby can't handle another botched soldering job.

  • Registered: 2010-12-04
  • Posts: 58

Re: Cautionary Tale: Think before you solder.

I direct wired one of mine to a ribbon cable. The other end of the cable had a dual row socket connector on and that's where I plugged in the my stuff.

  • Registered: 2011-01-08
  • Posts: 17

Re: Cautionary Tale: Think before you solder.

I have yet to solder to my Infocast, but when I do I think I'll do the same as clay_shooter and solder directly to a ribbon cable with a regular female IDC on it.

Usually when I have to desolder multi-pin things, I sacrifice the part and chop it up with dikes so I can remove it contact by contact. I felt horrible doing it at first but now I've learned to live with it.

  • Registered: 2011-02-07
  • Posts: 24

Re: Cautionary Tale: Think before you solder.

clay_shooter wrote:

I direct wired one of mine to a ribbon cable. The other end of the cable had a dual row socket connector on and that's where I plugged in the my stuff.

I considered that too, and it's probably the best option considering the space requirements(if a 90degree dual row header doesn't fit). All I had laying around were old hdd ribbons with impossibly tiny stranded wires that intimidated my shaky hands and not-exactly-badass soldering skills. Did you use a hdd cable? If so, did you just tin the strands together and solder up no problem?

skcolb wrote:

Usually when I have to desolder multi-pin things, I sacrifice the part and chop it up with dikes so I can remove it contact by contact. I felt horrible doing it at first but now I've learned to live with it.

The horror! Probably the best choice though. Once my parts bin is a bit more overflowing with replacement header I may just start doing that.