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One tricky part

A project log for Crazy Clock

A replacement controller for Lavet stepper clock movements

nick-sayerNick Sayer 08/03/2015 at 22:330 Comments

One thing I've discovered a couple of times now is that the retrofit process for removing the manufacturer's oscillator PCB and replacing it with the purpose-built one is not completely trivial.

The pins that are soldered to the board aren't actually held in place by much of anything. They have the magnet wire from the coil wrapped around them below the board and they're just sitting in molded plastic sockets, sort of. What this means is that you must be extraordinarily careful to insure that the pins are completely free from the board before you attempt to pull it away. Otherwise, you risk putting undue tension on the coil wires. If you break those wires, repairing them is virtually impossible. The wires are incredibly fine and they're insulated. Stripping the insulation off without breaking the wire (again) is very difficult. It's not so bad if you break the wire coming from the outside of the coil. You can simply take one turn off the coil and have some slack. But if you break the inside wire, you're hosed.

This isn't such a big deal for me - I'm used to the process. But it does make it just a little bit tedious. I could do a batch of a few hundred in a weekend for a "starter" retail order, but in larger volumes, it's going to be necessary to restart the conversation with Primex to see how a manufacturing run could be done substituting the crazy board for theirs.

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