I used some modeling clay (for kids) to put a Nano and two shields on the clay so that they don't touch each other when I test them. This works fine.
Now I think about if modeling clay is also a good material to "fix" parts in a small plastic box - and this should be usable for at least days of weeks, maybe longer.
In this case I plan to use the electronics in the box outside in a place which is protected against rain but the temperature will be 30 to 40 degrees Celsius and high humidity.
Does anybody have experience with this? Will the clay get hard or maybe soft?
What would be a good material to fix items in a small box without making this permanent. It should be possible to remove the parts again.
I would guess that modelling clay had some amount of water in it so would not be suitable for electronics.
Thanks for my first online Karma!
No water
And I can't even measure any Mega Ohm of resistance...
I got the idea when I saw a video of someone soldering a small part. He put that part on modeling clay and that worked perfectly fine. That's how it started...
That polymer stuff is not a clay chemically, clays are wet and conduct electricity too well for electronics.
My suspicion is the polymer stuff has an inert oil to plasticize it, and will not absorb moisture (easy to test by putting some in water for a few days).
Some kid's clay is water based, will dry out/harden over time, and is probably somewhat conductive (e.g. Play-Doh).
Other children's clay is oil based and these soften with rising temperature in my (not very recent) experience. They would probably retain their shape and adhesive strength well enough for this sort of application lying flat. I'd be surprised if it worked well as the only fastener on a vertical wall or upside down.
Great idea - play-doh is indeed water based, when it dries out a bit you can revitalise it with a few drops of water. That I learnt as daddy. As child I had a kneadable stuff that was waterproof, I used it in the bathtub as well, that should be safe with electronics.
For something more permanent I'd prefer using hot melt glue. That stuff is meant for such applications. This children's stuff sounds great for things like prototyping, or for short-lived demos, where you want to recover your parts afterwards. Hot melt adhesive is not exactly easy to remove.
That could make an interesting combination of electronics and cooking.
Deep fried bread with integrated LEDs (if an LED can survive a reflow oven it can survive a few minutes of deep frying, similar temperature, the solder joints may be a bit of an issue though).
I'd want to know the mineral content of the materials used, a gathering of electrolytes on contact points could be a mess at a later time and I'd also want to know of the dialectic capacities of the materials
I used modeling clay in our storefront window last summer. We had air conditioning to 21 C and the direct sunlight on the clay was enough to frequently melt the clay. On days that it did not fall apart, it was still very soft.
TomGeorge:
Hi,
What is the project, they look like CANBUS breakout boards?
Tom...
This is part of a 3 part project.
This is the first part: Two CAN-bus modules on one Nano, one module is the sender and one is the receiver.
They just produce dummy traffic for testing of the 2nd part of the project.
If I would use only a sender module without receiver the sender module would never get an acknowledge "reply" for the sent frames. This is why I use two modules.
The 2nd part of the project is a CAN-bus logger which will log all the CAN signals in my motorcycle. With that log I should be able to analyze the IDs and data. Currently I work on that part of the project and that part will go into a small plastic box in my bike.
The 3rd part of the project is to use some of the information from the CAN-bus to trigger some other events.
I.e. the headlight in my KTM Duke has no connectors for low beam, high beam, etc. It has a CAN-bus connection and there will be a code to switch on i.e. high beam. I want know that code and then switch on additional lights. Maybe I get the information about the applied brake pressure. If I get that I will do something like: high pressure on the brake = extra brake light.
I will also be able to see temperatures, RPM and lots of other info. I am sure some ideas will come to my mind what to do with all that info...
Edgar1:
...
I got the idea when I saw a video of someone soldering a small part. He put that part on modeling clay and that worked perfectly fine. That's how it started...
that might actually have been "Blu-Tack" though - it's more of a temporary, but reusable, adhesive - originally designed for office use, or sticking papers to walls.
wvmarle:
...Hot melt adhesive is not exactly easy to remove.
i thought rubbing alcohol could be used.
it's certainly worked for me - the other surface was smooth hard plastic, and the glue (clump) just lifted off.
I do use “play doh” sometimes to hold components in place while soldering. It is a bit friable though and tends to leave little crumbs in holes , between ic legs etc. some care is needed.
I would not consider using it as anything like a potting compound or as a general means of affixing assemblies in a semi permanent way unless I was absolutely sure I would not have to rework the boards etc. afterwards.
