General > General Technical Chat

Tricks of the Trade - knowledge for every day life

<< < (25/31) > >>

eti:
Especially pertinent to consumer goods servicing:

ALWAYS ALWAYS thoroughly clean a piece of equipment before returning it to the customer. It’s a matter of pride in one’s work, and shows the customer you pay attention to the little details. We used to use “Ambersil” foaming cleaner to give our TVs a good scrubbing of tar and grime, before sending them back into their dirty homes to pick up a fresh lot. 😄

If your a subscriber to “Mr Carlson’s Lab” on Patreon, he has an excellent video on how to run a repair business, and his ethics PRECISELY align with mine.

KE5FX:

--- Quote from: eti on December 11, 2022, 07:43:28 am ---Always *twist* a stranded wire and then solder saturate it into a solid end (and then clean off any flux) and then cut it flush and clean at the tip, before screwing into a terminal block. If possible use captive terminal types, the ones with the ridged moving flat clamp which rides up and down with the screw and applies even pressure across the wire end, otherwise excess tightening causes screw-shaped pits in the wire end, and if it’s not been soldered as above, you get little copper strand ends falling out everywhere, which not only means short circuit risk but means the cross-sectional amperage rating of the end has decreased.

--- End quote ---

The problem with that is that solder will cold-flow, potentially enough to loosen the connection over time.  When clamping stranded wire into a terminal block or wrapping it around a screw terminal, I prefer to twist the strands together and then apply solder only to the end of the wire, using just enough to keep it from fraying.  Haven't had trouble with the strands breaking, myself.

eti:

--- Quote from: KE5FX on December 11, 2022, 08:25:44 am ---
--- Quote from: eti on December 11, 2022, 07:43:28 am ---Always *twist* a stranded wire and then solder saturate it into a solid end (and then clean off any flux) and then cut it flush and clean at the tip, before screwing into a terminal block. If possible use captive terminal types, the ones with the ridged moving flat clamp which rides up and down with the screw and applies even pressure across the wire end, otherwise excess tightening causes screw-shaped pits in the wire end, and if it’s not been soldered as above, you get little copper strand ends falling out everywhere, which not only means short circuit risk but means the cross-sectional amperage rating of the end has decreased.

--- End quote ---

The problem with that is that solder will cold-flow, potentially enough to loosen the connection over time.  When clamping stranded wire into a terminal block or wrapping it around a screw terminal, I prefer to twist the strands together and then apply solder only to the end of the wire, using just enough to keep it from fraying.  Haven't had trouble with the strands breaking, myself.

--- End quote ---


Good point re only the end. But the gold standard of stranded wire termination for terminal block insertion is crimp ferrules :)

mikeselectricstuff:

--- Quote from: EEVblog on December 23, 2021, 10:45:42 pm ---Don't know if it's already on here, but turning a can of compressed air upside down turns it into a handy freeze spray for detecting faulty components.

--- End quote ---
And often vice-versa- can of freezer upside down can give an air blast, depends on type though

mikeselectricstuff:
1mm pitch ribbon cable crimps nicely into RJ45 and RJ11 connectors - handy if you need some short, very flexible ethernet cables.   

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page

There was an error while thanking
Thanking...
Go to full version
Powered by SMFPacks Advanced Attachments Uploader Mod