New progress and questions!

[Wmacky]

Everything has arrived, except my "Dynakit" trannies which should be here tomorrow. I've mounted all the sockets, jacks, bias pots, and cord. The board is almost fully populated! (my first one, Whew!) I now have some really newbie questions:

1.I'm ready to solder in the 9 pin sockets, Should I bend the pins ( in or out) to lock them in before soldering, like I did the resistors, or should I just try to keep them level?

2.The holes for the wire connections on the DIY board are really big and the wire is tiny? Do I try to fill the hole with solder, or solder the wires to one side of the holes? Seems like the solder would drip through.

3. Is there suppost to be a ground lug on the octal sockets, as the diagrams suggest? My sockets have no ground for the 10 ohm resistors. What do I do here?

[mesherm]

1. bend all the 9 socket lugs to the outside while holding the socket flush to the PCB to start, then solder 2 opposing pins. Check the socket alignment and solder a third pin if OK... then solder remaining pins.
2. bend the lead to the outside so that it is touching the plated through hole as much as possible then fill the hole with solder but just use as much solder as necessary to fill the hole. To much will just bulge out the bottom and look bad.
3. the original ST70 octal sockets had a metal ring with 4 small solder lugs around the outside that grounded to the chassis. What I have done with sockets not having this feature is to place one or two #6 solder lugs under either one of the two mounting screws holding the sockets to the chassis. I have used solder lugs with 2 holes so that I can run one conductor from each side through each lug to the star ground. I have also just used single hole lugs trusting the chassis as a ground for the 10 ohm (or 15.6 ohm) cathode resistors. Both methods seemed to have worked.

[Wmacky]

To be clear on question 2, i'm referring to to the terminal holes that accept the hookup wire. Why are they so big, and do I completely fill them with solder too?

Thats bad news on the solder lugs, as I have no extras. Guy's, I have 3 day's off work and wanted to get alot of this done, but now i'm dead in the water. I live in a large city without a single true electronics supply house. Radio shack looks bleak for solder lugs. Any quick ideas? I'm using those top mounted gold ring sockets.

[WA4SWJ]

Hi Wmacky,

Try Home Depot or Lowes. They have some small electrical supplies and I've found terminals and grommets and all kinds of goodies. Not a Radio Shack (well at least like Radio Shack used to be) but you may well find some stuff you need. Look in the electrical department area where hook up wire is. You'll find a lot of small electrical parts.

Good luck and all the best on getting it finished!

Regards,

[mesherm]

A quick alternative to solder lugs would be #6 ring terminal crimp connectors. Those are readily available at most Pep Boy, AutoZone or hardware stores. If they only have the insulated ones just remove the insulation.
Some of the holes on a stock ST70 PCB were actually like hollow brass rivets and were quite large but then the suppiled solid hookup wire was large too. The wire MUST make mechanical connection to the hole. If the wire is small, try to bend the protruding end over until it is as flush as possible then solder. Trim or cut so that nothing touches another adjacent trace. You could also try folding the wire double before inserting it in the hole.

[Wmacky]

Thanks for all the help guys! After a fustrating search, i'll be using ring terminals as suggested. I'm a little bummered as I wanted a really nice looking wiring job Yellow_Light_Colorz_PDT_14 .

One more quick question..........

The power transformer is held together with 4 long bolts and nuts / washers. do I remove the nuts and use them under the chasis to bolt it in, or do I need more nuts? IE I can't tell from the pics if there are nuts between the trannie and the chasiss.

[mesherm]

No, keep the nuts and bolts supplied on the tranny as is. Do not disassemble. The existing nuts will properly space the tranny above the chassis. Use new washers and nuts on the underside to bolt the tranny to the chassis.

[Wmacky]

I'll get the extra hardware this morning! I'm now pushing ahead with the project and wiring it up today!