Off-Board wire breakage solution

[Pushtone]

I kept having a problem with off-board wires breaking at the PCB solder point. It was happening a lot because I was moving the PBC around after it was in the box and all OB wires were in place. I would open the Orange Squezzer to adjust the trim pot and a wire would break. This kept happening until I found this solution.

I got these "sockets" and discovered that when pulled out of their plastic housing they had a spade shape and they fit perfectly in the holes of my GGG PCB. These spades make desoldering EZ and you can solder several wires to one spade. I can't tell you what these "sockets" are. The fellow at my LES (local electronics store) didn't know what to call them. I was shopping for transistor sockets and got a bag of 200 for $2.50.

[The Tone God]

Those are called header sockets. They allow the interfacing of wires and other boards through a small form connector on the circuit board. You can buy actual wire soldering points for circuit boards but for convience taking apart a header socket works too.

Have you though about drilling a hole the size of the wire insulation just past the circuit hole then looping the wire through the hole for strain relief ?

Andrew

[mrsage]

What are these for?

http://www.smallbearelec.com/Detail.bok?no=64

[moosapotamus]

Have you though about drilling a hole the size of the wire insulation just past the circuit hole then looping the wire through the hole for strain relief?

That works for me.

What are these for?
http://www.smallbearelec.com/Detail.bok?no=64

See Steve's Tweak-O project...
http://www.smallbearelec.com/Projects/TweakO/TweakO.htm

~ Charlie

[MartyB]

For perf, the wire-thru-hole trick works well.  You just drill out a hole slightly larger than the original.  For pcbs with alot of offboard wiring I just goop over the board on the component side, at the point where the wire attaches, with glue from a hot glue gun.  That gives good strain relief also.  I tend to get lazy about boxing something, so I diddle with it until wires start to break.  It doesn't seem to matter how careful you are. :?
MartyB

[jmusser]

I strain relief through the perf like Charlie does. I spin an exacto knife in the holes to enlarge them, and pass them up and back through like you've done, only, a hole away from the edge of the board.

[Pushtone]

Goop on your board?!? I guess you'll never be desoldering those connections.
Sounds messy and MORE WORK. The idea is to make the job EZ and the connection reliable. No drilling, no glue.

[MartyB]

Why would I want to desolder them?  I thought you were looking for solutions for breaking wires.  The strain relief methods keep you from having to re-solder.  The hot glue trick is used in pro builds like BK Butler.

MartyB

[petemoore]

I aim the wire at the hole, solder. Then when stuck through the hole, you can pull and twist pretty good and it doesn't stress the uninsulated portion or the solder joint, actually the 'rims of the barrel of the hole drilled in the board grabs the wire from being pulled, especially when the hole isn't much bigger than the wire. Larger hole I may run two wires through if one's ground.
 Once I religiously began running wires through holes I have had no loose strands or broken wires.
 The stranded wire I'm using is pretty rugged, it's the battery clips that have the least trusty wire.

[Alex C]

I like Small Bear's push in terminals/ flea clips.  Most of my builds have the copper side of the board facing down (when looking into the box), so I like to have my wire connections on the component side for easy access in case I need to desolder.
While tinkering, I save all my clipped component leads, and I often use one of these bent into a "P" shape, with the bottom part going through to the solder side, so the loop of the P is my solder point.   This is very cheap and effective.

But I suppose this doesn't help with strain relief.  I've used hot glue before, and it worked fine, but it was a "final build," so I knew I wouldn't be needing to desolder.

[Pushtone]

{snip...} I often use one of these bent into a "P" shape,

Like this?


I was doing this until I discovered the spades.

[Alex C]

Yes sir, that's it.  Nice stuff there.  I like this method because it's free and I never have to worry about restocking.

EDIT: What kind of lead/wire are you using for that?  It looks quite thick, and even "squared off" on the edges.

[Pushtone]

Yes sir, that's it.  Nice stuff there.  I like this method because it's free and I never have to worry about restocking.

GOOD POINT MAN

EDIT: What kind of lead/wire are you using for that?  It looks quite thick, and even "squared off" on the edges.

See the pic at the top of the thread. It's the lower section below the "spade".

I was just cutting the "header socket" leads off three at a time to twist into a "P" when i accidentally pulled one out of the plastic shell, saw the spade, and shouted eureka!

OK it's not Penicillin, but at least I go into my next project with more "techniques". One thing I've learned is good soldering skills only get you so far.

Looping through does look like a better solution on perf. This technique works great the PCB's from GGG (and other?). Keeps your package size down.

[Pushtone]

Those are called header sockets.

Andrew

Thanks Tone God for the ID on the part. Ask for them by name at your LES.

BTW They're terrible as transistor sockets which is what I was shopping for when I got these. Even though they has the correct lead spacing.

[MartyMart]

I was having the same problem, it was down to using very "thin" wire.
I now use much thicker 16/0.2 wire, ( stranded )  the centre "core" only just pokes through perf/vero board when stripped.
You can hold up the entire build from one of the wires with no problem !!
Bigger, stronger, better !

Marty.

[Paul Marossy]

I used to have that problem. Now, I just make sure the wire is in all the way to the insulation, tight to the PCB/perfboard when it's soldered in. That way, the wire can't move very much and the chances of breakage are much less.