is hot glue non-conductive?

[gnateye]

im soldering some really small wires to some really small connections very close together, can i put hot glue on whole mess when i am dont to insulate from the wires touching and make the whole thing stronger?

im making a memory card extension for my dreamcast machine, in case anyone is wondering what im talking about

anyways any help would be, well, helpful im in the middle of it now, but hotglueing can wait while i finish all the soldering, im also documenting the whole process for those who want to try it themselves

gnateye

[Lilwolf]

hot glue is safe..
but you can't drop the hotglue, the push the wires through... because you probably wouldn't get the connection (since the wire would have hotglue on it)

But we used to use hotglue to keep all the cards on all computers that we built to send.  Hotglue reduced 90% of our tech calls (since they where all because of cards popping out or cables falling off...)  

We did start getting some that where what is this jelly all over my motherboard with spider webs on it...

[gnateye]

they are soldered on good and strong, and im putting them into the vmu case again, but im gonna put hotglue all over the conection area, and to glue the wire to the case incase it gets pulled or something. thanx for hte info, i will post pics when im done

[CitznFish]

We did start getting some that where what is this jelly all over my motherboard with spider webs on it...

rofl!  

[grafixmonkey]

im soldering some really small wires to some really small connections very close together, can i put hot glue on whole mess when i am dont to insulate from the wires touching and make the whole thing stronger?

gnateye

I've done that, it usually works great.  If the hot glue is supposed to be structurally supporting tiny wires, you might consider dremel-ing a little hole that the hot glue can flow through and hold onto, because my hot glue likes to stick to things only until I stop looking directly at it.

There are also a few compounds you can buy - there's an insulating varnish you can paint over a finished PCB that will coat and insulate all the contacts with a nice thin layer, and there's "liquid electrical tape" that's kinda thick and gooey and hardens into a rubbery substance, good for coating spliced wires.

[IceCold]

I put hot glue all over the 2 gamepads I hacked for my MAME cabinet, to keep the wires from coming loose.  It seems to be working so far.

[traknfieldSUPAstar]

I put hot glue all over the 2 gamepads I hacked for my MAME cabinet, to keep the wires from coming loose.  It seems to be working so far.

same here... i used hot glue all over the two gamepads i hacked too... mainly because of bad soldering technique on my part (i just heated up a blob of solder on the tip of my iron and then dropped it unto the contact lead and the wire  )... it's held up pretty well so far

[grafixmonkey]

don't forget some chips have to dissipate heat    

probably not a problem with gamepad controller chips but I wouldn't coat a memory chip entirely with hot glue, it'd be like putting your memory in a parka and telling it to go jogging.

[IceCold]

don't forget some chips have to dissipate heat    

probably not a problem with gamepad controller chips but I wouldn't coat a memory chip entirely with hot glue, it'd be like putting your memory in a parka and telling it to go jogging.

I only put the hot glue over where I soldered, and there was no soldering onto chips.  That does bring up a good point though, I bet hot glue would hold in the heat on certain things, so you should be careful.

[gnateye]

thanx for all he replies, no chips in this projects, just 14 small pins, witha ribbin cable soldered onto it, i should have picks today.

soldering samll pins is hard work it took me most of the day to do the 1st 14, and i burned myself with the iron for the 1st ime and i have been solderigfor a while,





gnat

[1UP]

Also consider that if you ever need to solder anything near where you've hot glued, it's going to be a MESS!  Use little enough that it can be picked off, if needed, for repairs/modifications.

[gnateye]

good tip! thanx, i hadnt thought of that


gnat

[gnateye]

thanx for the help everyone, here spics of the process (at the bottom of the page)


http://www.cosmicbreaks.com/images/arcade_stick/

gnat

[RandyT]

There was another thread about doing this a while back.

If the glue is for strain relief, DON'T put it right on the contacts.  Glue the wire to the board somewhere else an inch or two back.

As long as you have good strong joints, it'll do the same thing but still make it repairable if you need to.

RandyT

[grafixmonkey]

For this old project I did I had to fix heavy cat5 wire to a protoboard so that none of the pins could pull out even when I pulled the other end of the cat5 across the room and messed with it.  So, I used a stiff springy clamp on the side of the board - I bet hot-gluing your cable along the side of the pcb would get a real great, strong connection.