HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

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eslapion
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by eslapion »

norm8332 wrote:Yeah, but unfortunately that doesn't include what I know is an issue with the unnecessary beveling of the fiberglass boards. It is clear to me that this is a serious wear issue. The problem is all of these designs including in the link you provided are for use for a pretty limited lifespan. We are trying to extend the lifespan.
I will have to check with other engineers how much of a problem the fiberglass embedded in PCBs can be a problem to female edge connectors and what impact they can have on their lifespan.

Your posts triggered my curiosity and I decided to check my own Ultimate Expander which I made (and sold) back in 2006-2008. Since I lacked experience at the time, I had left other qualified people to take the PCB fabrication decisions about this product. It's gold plated only on the edge connector with hard gold plating and, to my surprise, it's a resin board - no fiberglass. Looks like there are benefits to leaving some stuff to experienced people.

This being said, since even Vector makes their boards with fiberglass, I suspect it has a much smaller lifespan reducing impact compared to using HASL on an edge connector.

Also, if you look at the old vs new Behr-Bonz photo posted here: http://sleepingelephant.com/ipw-web/bul ... &start=194

... you'll see the old one is also resin only and it is gold plated in exactly the same way the Ultimate Expanders were. That's because the company which made both the Ultimate Expanders' PCBs as well as those from the first batch of Behr-Bonz is the same one. Multifor is unfortunately now out of business.

Hard gold plating restricted to the edge connector, the absence of fiberglass in the PCB material and the absence of a soldermask are the 3 distinctive features of these PCBs.

Added edit:
I have a bunch of various 44 pin boards with 0.156" spacing edge connectors. These include a Vector 3662 (still in stock at Digikey!! mine must be 30 years old), a Vector 3474-2 (discontinued), a Radio Shack 276-187 and another Radio Shack 276-154A. All of these use resin only PCBs; no fiberglass.

This being said, the Radio Shack boards have no gold plating. The 276-187 is solder only (lead-tin which predates HASL) and the 276-154A is even worst with bare copper.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by vicist »

How easy/cheap would it be to produce a single slot extension to save wear and tear on the Vic's original expansion port? Something simple to replace if it wears out.
Not everyone has the luxury of a 3 to 6 slot switchable expansion board.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by eslapion »

vicist wrote:How easy/cheap would it be to produce a single slot extension to save wear and tear on the Vic's original expansion port? Something simple to replace if it wears out.
Not everyone has the luxury of a 3 to 6 slot switchable expansion board.
Making a quick search for new parts on Digikey, the Vector 3662-5 is the cheapest dev board they sell. You can cut it and attach one of the TRW 252-22-50-100 females which I sell for 6$US (5 Euros) each.

I know for sure there is a couple of other solutions. More to come...

Added edit:
Still from Digikey, Sullins sells a unique male edge connector which you can directly attach to a female edge connector of your choosing. (Your personal cartridge port condom ? :lol: )

The part number is EBM22MMWD and it is less than half the price of any dev board you may want to hack for it's gold plated connector. It is made of plastic so it will obviously not grind the surface of the female connector into which you'd want to insert it like fiberglass could.

You can probably even use it to turn a HASL cartridge into a gold plated one by just soldering it to the edge of the HASL board.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by norm8332 »

eslapion wrote:I will have to check with other engineers how much of a problem the fiberglass embedded in PCBs can be a problem to female edge connectors and what impact they can have on their lifespan.
After a very brief google search: http://www.google.com.pg/patents/US6914189 Read the section under description, background on the first page. I'm sure there are more if time is spent looking. Note that part of the solution is a non-beveled card for fiberglass.

EDIT: Here is another one that prevents fiberglass from contacting the connector pins https://www.google.com/patents/US6234807 Browser search "fiberglass" to see the relevant text.

Another: http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4572604.html Excerpt: "....but insertion of the glass epoxy edge on the board, which is often beveled for ease of insertion into the connector, abrades the plated contact surfaces of the edge connector contacts. Therefore, replacing the leading edge which engages a card edge connector with a less abrasive material than glass epoxy would substantially reduce the wear on the card edge connector contacts."

Done for now.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by vicist »

I suppose the big question is - is there anyone out there willing to make one for us non soldering types? :wink:
Or give an idiots guide on how to easily put one together.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by eslapion »

norm8332 wrote:... "replacing the leading edge which engages a card edge connector with a less abrasive material than glass epoxy would substantially reduce the wear on the card edge connector contacts."
I'm sure there are good reason why Commodore, Vector, Radio-Shack and Multifor 25 years later would have elected to use circuit boards free of fiberglass.

At the same time, I also note the curvature of the contacts used in the R644 series as well as both the TRW female connectors which I sell and those of the EDAC 307 series of connectors is very different from the Cinch connectors used in the VIC-20cr.

The curvature on the metal tabs is very steep near the outside edge of the female connectors and rapidly becomes much shallower. The effect is the contact with fiberglass is really only possible when the beveled border is only touching the top or down row of contacts. Only once the PCB is centered between the 2 rows is there pressure on the contacts and at that point it is no longer possible for the fiberglass to touch the contacts.

This photo is from another type of TRW connector which is only different in color and pins from those I sell:
Image

They look as if there was more space to insert a board compared to the Cinch connector but there isn't. The main difference is the curvature of the contacts. The plastic structure of this family of connectors which guides the board towards the center makes it almost impossible for fiberglass to damage the contacts.

I can only conclude Commodore people truly choose the flimsiest junk when they elected not to use Vector female edge connectors anymore for the VIC-20cr. If they did it for the edge connector, they must have done the same for pretty much everything else about that revision of the VIC-20.

Added edit:
This is a Vector R644:
Image
On this one too, you can see all the way down inside and it seems pretty clear the plastic structure will guide an inserted board towards the center before the contacts mate. Here too damage by fiberglass seems highly unlikely.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by norm8332 »

So only VIC-20 CR users should be concerned? About 1+ million CRs were sold and a lot of them still in use. How about the other Engineer's opinions in the above patent links, now their opinion doesn't matter? I haven't checked the non-CR connector for this type of wear yet..maybe I have to. I have 11 of them...enough to see a pattern IMO.
“In religion and politics people’s beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination... whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing.”

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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by norm8332 »

vicist wrote:I suppose the big question is - is there anyone out there willing to make one for us non soldering types? :wink:
Or give an idiots guide on how to easily put one together.
I'd be happy to make a 'how to guide' when a definite solution is found. :)
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by eslapion »

norm8332 wrote:So only VIC-20 CR users should be concerned? About 1+ million CRs were sold and a lot of them still in use.
AFAIK, yes. Since my oldest VIC has a Vector R644 connector inside, I assumed all other VICs were like that. Seems I was wrong.
How about the other Engineer's opinions in the above patent links, now their opinion doesn't matter?
Never said that. If the Cinch connector used in the VIC-20cr is affected, many others may be as well but that doesn't look like the vast majority.

These cheap connectors have no gold plating, they have very flimsy contacts which bend and distort easily and they have a general design which seems to be a rarity when compared to the thousands of other connectors with the same number of pins and spacing.

Added edit:
Closely inspecting the cart port connector on my NTSC VIC-20cr, half a dozen contacts are bent out of shape with apparently no hope of ever getting them back straight.
I haven't checked the non-CR connector for this type of wear yet..maybe I have to. I have 11 of them...enough to see a pattern IMO.
I don't have that many VICs myself. I suppose having more statistics can only help.

I just discovered my own PAL VIC-20cr, just like my NTSC VIC-20cr, has the cheap Cinch connector.
Last edited by eslapion on Fri Jan 05, 2018 10:36 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by eslapion »

My first VIC-20 cartridge port 'condom'... built for Vicist.
passthrough A
passthrough A
passthrough B
passthrough B
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by beamrider »

could do with something like this that has a switch to disable auto-start..
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by eslapion »

beamrider wrote:could do with something like this that has a switch to disable auto-start..
All too easy! Just add a switch and pull-up resistor to the BLK5 line!

Want one now?

Since all auto-start cartridges made in the 1980s don't use BLK2, you could also redirect the BLK5 line from the cart to the BLK2 line of the VIC. This way, even when disabling auto-start, you can still access the content of the cart.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by norm8332 »

eslapion wrote:My first VIC-20 cartridge port 'condom'... built for Vicist.
102_0795.JPG
102_0796.JPG
Nice! That will work! It will solve both issues. I will eventually get to examining the non CRs. Been a bit busy.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by eslapion »

norm8332 wrote:
eslapion wrote:My first VIC-20 cartridge port 'condom'... built for Vicist.
Nice! That will work! It will solve both issues. I will eventually get to examining the non CRs. Been a bit busy.
It was so easy. Just playing Lego with off-the-shelf parts.
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Re: HASL for cartridges? (split/OT from: Cheese & Onion)

Post by TLovskog »

Interesting topic with glassfiber and edge connectors.
eslapion wrote: I have a bunch of various 44 pin boards with 0.156" spacing edge connectors. These include a Vector 3662 (still in stock at Digikey!! mine must be 30 years old), a Vector 3474-2 (discontinued), a Radio Shack 276-187 and another Radio Shack 276-154A. All of these use resin only PCBs; no fiberglass.
Actually the Vector 3662 uses CEM-1 as base material (double checked my memory on the data sheet). This is a paper core sandwiched between a continuous woven glassfiber cloth (one side) and then infiltrated with a flame resistant epoxy resin binder. CEM-2 doesn't have flame retardant. CEM-3 which also has chopped fiberglass in the core. Cheap materials.

The only true non glassfiber material I know of is the old FR-1 and FR-2. They where true paper and phenolic resin based with copper. However, they tend to have a very poor bonding strength to copper, delaminates easily and absorbs moister. But cheap and easy to punch all those holes all at once. FR-3 was the same, but with epoxy resin.

Still the newest of new 25Gb/s from Molex edge connectors stipulate glassfiber board material in their application specifications. Modern FR-4 material is also way better woven than the old crusty 80's version. The edges looks smooth as a baby's skin ... well sort of.

But that said. I am all ears and ready to learn. I got very curious here. Obviously there is a risk here.

And while on-topic, I would also choose proper gold connectors. The cost is negligible and a way to show extra extra love and tender care for our old machines.
Last edited by TLovskog on Sat Jan 06, 2018 3:29 am, edited 2 times in total.
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