Intermittent right channel - back again

[Gepetto]

I had to look that up, dykes in the context of tool and I saw....side-cutters. Never heard them called dykes before.

So would sacrificing a relay to preserve a PCB apply in all cases or just when a double sided board is involved?

I have a reason for asking.

If the part is bad, it is a no brainer...sacrifice the bad part.

 

[62vauxhall]

working one lead at a time and getting all the solder out, and using a popsicle stick use light lateral force and break the "sweat joint", but you must use a lot of heat on a component like that or you wont melt the solder on the opposite side of the board. Sometimes, TOO MUCH solder is applied during installation and it makes for difficult removal. Also, when installing a relay like those, I do NOT lay them upside down since gravity will pull some of that solder deeper than it needs to go. Laying the board 90 degrees to the work surface and put only enough solder to cover the pad................ Don't keep feeding it in.

Yep, I can understand that now.

When I removed the existing relays and installed the new ones, I was a bit confounded as to where all the solder was going? I envisioned it pooling and spreading between the relay and the board shorting out pins ergo the dead channel.

 

[62vauxhall]

That's what side cutters are called 99% of the time I've heard talk of side cutters.


2nd part, that depends. If your solder removal is adequate, you don't have to destroy the component. Even with a REALLY good solder sucker, sometimes you have to go Joe's route. If I am removing a component I want to keep I'll do the solder suck thing then "wiggle" the component. Not enough to separate a via or trace but enough to see if it's loose, if not I'll heat and suck again. At this point heat damage to surrounding components, traces and vias is possible, so I do it quick and leave the sucker on it longer to drag cooler air over the area. Gary, there really are no hard and fast rules, just observe how it's going and make the next call based on that.

As I was trying to remove the relays it did not occur to me that it would be any different than with a single sided board. I will admit that their not coming off as I was expecting upped the the frustration which upped the physical force used to pry them away.

I've got more of my Dad in my than I care to admit.

 

[grapplesaw]

items like that relay are hard to remove easily. The best way to remove things like this is to sacrifice the component for the sake of the PCB. Frequent practice is to cut the top of the component away with Dremel and then dykes until you get down to each individual pin. Then a simple heating of the isolated pin and pin removal with tweezers is usually all that is needed. After that, solder suck the hole out.

in Canada Dykes are found on Robson and Davie St in Vancouver, not on the work bench. Just saying things are a little different accross the boarder

 

[laatsch55]

Well.....you Canadians.....are a wee bit different.....

 

[grapplesaw]

Well.....you Canadians.....are a wee bit different.....

my American kids might agree with you. We take our boots off at the door.

 

[laatsch55]

So do we, in the mud room....

 

[grapplesaw]

So do we, in the mud room....

Our Oregon based Son always wears his boots into the house. I stand guard every time they come to visit and always take off my shoes at their place. We sure do not see eye to eye on that one.

 

[orange]

in Canada Dykes are found on Robson and Davie St in Vancouver, not on the work bench. Just saying things are a little different accross the boarder

I've met a few good dykes in the 28 years I sang karaoke in Idaho bars...they have the same relationship problems as anybody else, just no dudes.

 

[laatsch55]

We have rooms between the house and the outdoors. They're called mudrooms where we take off all the outergear we have on, coveralls, booties, hats, etc. At my house we use the garage. No boots in my house either, too damn much oilfield carried on em, ruins carpet in a heartbeat....

 

[orange]

Is Alvin Lee here?

 

[WOPL Sniffer]

If the part is bad, it is a no brainer...sacrifice the bad part.

We were not allowed to sacrifice anything in the Navy, we had to turn in the suspected bad part when undergoing training. But, you gotta do what you gotta do. There are ways to do it if YOU ARE NOT IN A HURRY.

 

[jbeckva]

We were not allowed to sacrifice anything in the Navy, we had to turn in the suspected bad part when undergoing training. But, you gotta do what you gotta do. There are ways to do it if YOU ARE NOT IN A HURRY.

Those mercury relays were a bitch sometimes, weren't they? Especially the big bastards on the PS controllers...

 

[WOPL Sniffer]

Ah, you remember..... They were a bitch. And, working with some of the ancient board from the S-3 Vikings................ The good old days. That's why we had to send our stuff to 690 so the experts would thrash our stuff.

 

[wattsabundant]

So I've been on the road quite a bit and missed this thread. This is the only issue of it's kind that I know of. Unfortunately it appears there is no absolute root cause.

 

[grapplesaw]

So I've been on the road quite a bit and missed this thread. This is the only issue of it's kind that I know of. Unfortunately it appears there is no absolute root cause.

My take on the board failure, having fixed it, is it is not in the manufacturing process. It has been worked on a couple of times and the use of the two and three Phoenix connector strips does not give support to the through the board solder joints when tightening.

I strongly recommend a single seven pin Phoenix connector when building Don's boards.

I will order more boards soon from you Don, the current design is just fine by me.

 

[Gepetto]

My take on the board failure, having fixed it, is it is not in the manufacturing process. It has been worked on a couple of times and the use of the two and three Phoenix connector strips does not give support to the through the board solder joints when tightening.

I strongly recommend a single seven pin Phoenix connector when building Don's boards.

I will order more boards soon from you Don, the current design is just fine by me.

Then dovetail the interconnects provided on the Phoenix connectors to make them as one. Look carefully, the dovetail details are tiny but very effective.

 

[laatsch55]

Yep, I've scavenged many a Phoenix connector from junk oilfield electronics. AND, if you use the right screwdriver and back up with your finger the connectors and boards hold up just fine. ON the 400DCP's, there are 3 separate, 3 hole terminals....

 

[grapplesaw]

Then dovetail the interconnects provided on the Phoenix connectors to make them as one. Look carefully, the dovetail details are tiny but very effective.

Yes the dovetails work well when put together. One piece are best. The ones in the board were not joined as you point out

 

[wattsabundant]

Clarification: The 700 uses 1, 7 pin connector. The 7 pin connector is made up of 1, 3 pin and 2, 2pin connectors as Joe described. If a single 7 pin connector is available I haven't seen it. The 400 board use 3, 3 pin Phoenix connectors. The middle pin is not used on the audio inputs to give extra clearance.

To all: This is my third straight week on the road. Most of which has been in Houston's 100+ degree heat. Thanks for your patience.