Hi again folks, long time no see!
Been on a bit of a hiatus from electronics, but am looking at getting back to my crappy old PIC programmer circuit now (yet again).
Last I was doing with it, I'd got the design and layout done for the final board, and made a horrible little case for it, but I had a bit of a stumbling-block with one particular part where I need the pin of the ZIF socket to pass through a hole in a track (it's all on stripboard!) without being electrically connected to that track. The track is carrying the data signal (or is it clock, I forget), and won't want to be taken a more roundabout route, and the pin going through it is just going to a pull-down resistor to ground, so isn't too critical, but I don't want them accidentally shorting each other.
(in case it's actually necessary, I made a little diagram, but the first half of it may actually make things more confusing. The hole isn't meant to be at the edge of the board, that's just how I drew it... )
So anyway, although the pin doesn't connect to the track it passes through, it will connect to a short solid wire-link to the resistor a cm away, so it's not as simple as merely putting a PVC sleeve or such over the pin (it'd melt to goop when I try soldering it at that short distance I think), and I'm thinking I'll need to put something on that patch of track to prevent any solder bridges forming between the pin/wire-link and the track. Does this make sense?
I don't have any proper solder-resist, and really don't want to buy anything just to do this (except maybe something very cheap from the shops), I figure something like a small piece of greased/waxed paper around the base of the pin. But I don't really want to just try something on a whim and screw up my rather elaborately prepared board and an hour or so's soldering. So anyone got any experience with this, or good ideas/advice?
Been on a bit of a hiatus from electronics, but am looking at getting back to my crappy old PIC programmer circuit now (yet again).
Last I was doing with it, I'd got the design and layout done for the final board, and made a horrible little case for it, but I had a bit of a stumbling-block with one particular part where I need the pin of the ZIF socket to pass through a hole in a track (it's all on stripboard!) without being electrically connected to that track. The track is carrying the data signal (or is it clock, I forget), and won't want to be taken a more roundabout route, and the pin going through it is just going to a pull-down resistor to ground, so isn't too critical, but I don't want them accidentally shorting each other.
(in case it's actually necessary, I made a little diagram, but the first half of it may actually make things more confusing. The hole isn't meant to be at the edge of the board, that's just how I drew it... )
So anyway, although the pin doesn't connect to the track it passes through, it will connect to a short solid wire-link to the resistor a cm away, so it's not as simple as merely putting a PVC sleeve or such over the pin (it'd melt to goop when I try soldering it at that short distance I think), and I'm thinking I'll need to put something on that patch of track to prevent any solder bridges forming between the pin/wire-link and the track. Does this make sense?
I don't have any proper solder-resist, and really don't want to buy anything just to do this (except maybe something very cheap from the shops), I figure something like a small piece of greased/waxed paper around the base of the pin. But I don't really want to just try something on a whim and screw up my rather elaborately prepared board and an hour or so's soldering. So anyone got any experience with this, or good ideas/advice?