Soldering wires with hot glue

B

Blaine

Hinako's Cook
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Now aside from the fact that it looks like ass-

Is there anything wrong with holding an electrical connection with hot glue?
The reason I used it was two-fold.

I made a DS USB power cable (instead of hacking up a good powersupply I took an old SP headphone connector I got for 2 bucks).

One, I don't trust my solders. I'm still learning. So while I did solder the wires together, I then laid some hotglue over the exposed area.

Two, I figured it'd be just as good as electrical tape to prevent a short and would give better structural strength.

So besides shame in poor craftsmanship, is there anything wrong with hot glue?
 
C

cps2

Goal! Goal! Goal!
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you could of bought a ds usb charger i think it aint wise to use glue on the wires
 
R

Reznor007

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The connection could get warm and cause the hot glue to fall off. I could probably recommend something to cover it, but I would have to see the joint and what kind of space there is.
 
dogtoy

dogtoy

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I use hot glue to hold solder in place sometimes, but not as a replacement for solder. For instance, I soldered all the controller wires from my jamma loom into a db-15 connector, but I used hot glue to hold the wires in place and keep them from shorting.

cheers,
-DT
 
ttooddddyy

ttooddddyy

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Ive used epoxy resin to hold wires in place before now.

But its important that the actual solder joint is sound.
 
B

Blaine

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Okay. Thanks guys.

Yeah. The wires are securely connected together. I tried my damnedst to follow Lawerence's wire soldering tutorial (but usually when I do. I wind up having to... do the things he says not to do. Like, I can NOT get solder to melt onto a pcb pad unless I touch it with the iron.) but, knowing I was going to have to glue the enclosure (it's in the enclosure the headphone adapter was in) shut, I didn't want to have to break it open when one of my solder joints fall apart.

But it sounds like it's okay. Now there's just the moment of panic when I hope that I have the right wires connected and I don't destroy my computer and my DS.
 
werejag

werejag

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hotglue is very common practice to add to a solder joint after its soldered. no problems will happen becuase of the hot glue.

trust me. in the us navy we used a simular compound for joints when we repaired aircraft.
 
M

Magnaflux

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Blaine said:
Okay. Thanks guys.

Yeah. The wires are securely connected together. I tried my damnedst to follow Lawerence's wire soldering tutorial (but usually when I do. I wind up having to... do the things he says not to do. Like, I can NOT get solder to melt onto a pcb pad unless I touch it with the iron.) but, knowing I was going to have to glue the enclosure (it's in the enclosure the headphone adapter was in) shut, I didn't want to have to break it open when one of my solder joints fall apart.

But it sounds like it's okay. Now there's just the moment of panic when I hope that I have the right wires connected and I don't destroy my computer and my DS.
Click to expand...

Generally, I heat up the points on the board using the iron and then apply the solder to the joints. Try to angle the iron on the board so as to expose more surface area of the iron to the contacts. Sometimes with very small contacts (ala xbox), I heat up the contacts and then just dab the end of the solder to bridge them.

In addition, one must be very careful to do things quickly. I had a PCB end up being problematic because I held the iron on the board too long, causing joints on the opposite side of the board to undo themselves!
 
dogtoy

dogtoy

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Magnaflux said:
In addition, one must be very careful to do things quickly. I had a PCB end up being problematic because I held the iron on the board too long, causing joints on the opposite side of the board to undo themselves!
Click to expand...

Uh... sounds like you really might want to invest in a lower wattage soldering iron!

cheers,
-DT
 
norton9478

norton9478

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Blaine said:
Okay. Thanks guys.

Yeah. The wires are securely connected together. I tried my damnedst to follow Lawerence's wire soldering tutorial (but usually when I do. I wind up having to... do the things he says not to do. Like, I can NOT get solder to melt onto a pcb pad unless I touch it with the iron.)
Click to expand...

What type of solder are you using?

Get the really thin stuff. Don't get the Lead Free. Get some with the silver shit.

As far as a pad goes, just try to put the solder as close to the iron as possible. It should melt when it gets really close to the iron.
 
dogtoy

dogtoy

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I use 60/38/2 (tin/lead/silver) the thinnest rosin core solder they have at radio shack. Makes excellent joints, looks spiffy on the board (very shiny), heats quickly (even w/ 15 watts), and also thin enough to tin pins on chips (very carefully!).

I'm probably gonna get a 15/30 switchable about the size of 15 watt iron but 30 when needed. I figure I can heat it up 30 and then switch it to 15 to use for any pcb operations. Would get a solder station, but that's a bit out of my price range at the moment.

cheers,
-DT
 
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