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bread board or bus board ? — Parallax Forums

bread board or bus board ?

henrytjhenrytj Posts: 90
edited 2013-09-30 22:36 in General Discussion
I've built my audio driver (from another discussion thread) and got it to work an a solderless breadboard. Of course, the problem that the connections are very vulnerable to shaking apart from vibration and handling.

One problem is that the breadboard I received, also has a flaw. One set of edge power bus lines of opposite polarity seem shorted together. Does this happen often. It's a first time for me and took awhile to troubleshoot the problem.

But, that aside, I want to rebuild my circuit to be more vibration and handling resistant.

I'm am gussinng that he easiest solution is to shorten the leads/legs of the "stick up" compontents to just long enough te reach and be flat againt the board.

But, I'm guessing that a better solution is the "soldered PCB prototype busboard." One with pre-connected rows and columns that match the solderless breadboard as close as possible. I am finding a variety of wording in the search keywords that give results. These seem about half the price of the closest matching solderless breadboard. Looking for suggestions on favored suppliers of these.

Plus I want to confirm that circuits built on these are slower in construction. It seems that each componet has to be inserted into the proper holes one by one (using the solderless e breadboard circuit is a reference) Then turning the breadboard over, soldering the lead/legs to the row/column. And finally, clipping the excess ends of the lead/leg off. Repeating for each component. But, of course the benefit of the slower build, is that a mere bump of a component won't cause the circuit to fail.

Are there any other easy possibiliets that I am missing. (no, not talking about an etched PCB.)

Thanks,
Henry

Comments

  • al1970al1970 Posts: 64
    edited 2013-09-23 00:26
    I have build solderless boards before by running most of the wires along the sides of the board and keeping the parts close to the board surface. Then using a glue gun, glue the wires to the side of the board and the parts together. It is much harder for the parts or wires to come loose.

    Al
  • phatallicaphatallica Posts: 64
    edited 2013-09-23 04:55
    Radio Shack has a couple types of PCBs that are laid out similar to a breadboard. This would make it visually easier to make a soldered version.

    Al - your idea is intriguing ... do mean hot melt glue?
  • Duane DegnDuane Degn Posts: 10,588
    edited 2013-09-23 10:58
    henrytj wrote: »
    One problem is that the breadboard I received, also has a flaw. One set of edge power bus lines of opposite polarity seem shorted together. Does this happen often.

    When I was new to using a breadboard, I occasionally pushed too much wire into the little hole. The wire would curve around and short a connection to the adjacent bus. Could this have been your problem?
  • henrytjhenrytj Posts: 90
    edited 2013-09-23 11:42
    Duane Degn wrote: »
    When I was new to using a breadboard, I occasionally pushed too much wire into the little hole. The wire would curve around and short a connection to the adjacent bus. Could this have been your problem?

    I don't think so. I think the metal part of the negative buss in the one corner might be bent and shorting to the adjacent positive bus. If I use the battery wire leads as probes, even just touch the wire tip in one of the batter wire I can see some faint flashes from tiny sparks when I have the lights in the room dimmed. And thing is on first contact from the tip of the wire. Before it's even pushed in. But, some other wire is pushed in too far. So it's worth checking.
  • henrytjhenrytj Posts: 90
    edited 2013-09-23 11:54
    al1970 wrote: »
    I have build solderless boards before by running most of the wires along the sides of the board and keeping the parts close to the board surface. Then using a glue gun, glue the wires to the side of the board and the parts together. It is much harder for the parts or wires to come loose.

    Al

    An interesting idea. At RS prices of $10 for a breadboard, I wouldn't do it. But the breadboard from the Asain (Hong Kong i think) was only $3.50. Which is about the same price as the PCB soldered one from RS. I admit that I am resistant to making permanent a solder-less breadboard that could be reused for other projects once the circuit has been copied to a soldered on, but I can also see the benefit of not having to rebuild the circuit at all and the hours saved in troubleshooting any mistake.

    However, I can also imagine the hot glue oozing down into the holes and somehow acting as an insulator.

    Are you talking about using a drop of hot glue where the component lead goes down into the breadboard hole? Hence the above mentioned concern of the hot glue oozing and acting at an insulator.

    Or, are you talking about gluing the component itself (such as a resistor, which seem the most common componet) to the surface of the breadboard? Might that hinder heat dissipation? And as there are holes just about everywhere, again might the glue ooze down those hole and cause trouble?

    And for the glue gun, are you using high-temp or low-temp hot glue gun? (I know, a low-temp hot glue sounds like contradiction.

    Are there glues such that they are a good compromise and hold the compenent down while still able to be removed. Even if with a solvent that is not detrimental to the breadboard itself?

    H.
  • Beau SchwabeBeau Schwabe Posts: 6,566
    edited 2013-09-23 12:08
    Typically a SBB (Solder-less Bread Board) is for prototyping and DEMO only, and is not meant for permanent deigns. Usually when you settle on a design that you want to commit to, you go the extra and make something a little more permanent. A bus board is convenient because there is a closer 1 to 1 correlation in component layout. Going a step further involves designing your own PCB board to fit your components. With each progression, note that the time required to put something together goes up, but so does the quality of your final design.
  • Duane DegnDuane Degn Posts: 10,588
    edited 2013-09-23 12:09
    I've pulled the foam tape off the back of a couple of breadboards. Once the tape was off, the metal clips were accessible. You might be able to check the clips in your power rails to see what's causing the short.
  • henrytjhenrytj Posts: 90
    edited 2013-09-23 12:31
    phatallica wrote: »
    Radio Shack has a couple types of PCBs that are laid out similar to a breadboard. This would make it visually easier to make a soldered version.

    Yes, I think this is what you are talking about.
    Matching Printed Circuit Board
    http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2102846&locale=en_US
    RS price of $3.49.

    Now this looks much the same solder-less breadboard at RS ($22), that I got from the HongKong supplier for ($3.50).

    So I'm guessing that if RS wants $3.50 for the soldered version, then it must be available elsewhere much, much cheaper. (like a $1, or less)
  • RDL2004RDL2004 Posts: 2,554
    edited 2013-09-23 12:54
    A good quality prototyping board or strip board will be made from FR-4 rated epoxy fiberglass and have double-sided plated-through holes and solder mask. As you go down in quality, eventually you end up with the cheap phenolic-impregnated brown paper boards, which have thin copper rings around the holes on one side of the board only. The copper rings tend to come loose easily from the heat of soldering. A good quality prototyping board or strip board can cost more than a similar size plastic breadboard.
  • henrytjhenrytj Posts: 90
    edited 2013-09-23 17:19
    Thanks for the info everyone. Yes, I would love to do things the proper way. I keep inching that direction, I like to think. Maybe when I have more confidence with what I'm doing with the circuit. (this one, or any other. Problem is I often set projects aside for weeks, months, or even years.) Anyway, the glue gun seems something worth trying. If the breadboard is already flawed, why not use if to ake this project permanent so I don't forget that the breadboard does have a problem.

    Thanks,
    H.
  • phatallicaphatallica Posts: 64
    edited 2013-09-23 19:12
    I tend to keep a small stock of Proto777 from Futurlec around as a general purpose PCB.

    One nice feature of the Proto777 is that the spacing in the middle is a perfect fit for a Basic Stamp or 40-pin DIP Propeller.
  • al1970al1970 Posts: 64
    edited 2013-09-30 22:36
    phatallica wrote: »
    Radio Shack has a couple types of PCBs that are laid out similar to a breadboard. This would make it visually easier to make a soldered version.

    Al - your idea is intriguing ... do mean hot melt glue?

    Hi, yes a hot melt glue. I do not put the glue into the holes, just on the parts. So if you had 6 parts close together and you glued them together; it would be very hard for the group of parts to come loose. I do this on cheap boards. I do not use this on parts that are going to give off lots of heat, so I don't worry about the glue making the parts warmer.

    Al
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