Hi,
I wondered if anyone knows of a decent solution for temporary mounting pins onto the Mini pro - or any board with holes? It would be great to be able to make a prototype setup before knowing what pins to solder on. I can imagine you could wedge something in, and can't imagine there isn't an existing solution for this, but not sure where and for what to look.
Thanks!
The Mini and Pro Mini are breadboard compatible. Solder some header pins onto them and plug 'em into a breadboard, then just prototype away.
There are such things as pogo pins - you'd need to make a breakout board to hold those pogo pins - they are what are used by companies such as sparkfun for testing boards. Sparkfun also sells the pins but they are a bit pricey - you can no doubt get them cheaper from other places.
Thanks! Pogo pins sound interesting, but blimey these are pricey. These http://www.farnell.com/datasheets/60455.pdf 'kinky pins' at Farnell look interesting as well.
but blimey these are pricey.
Yeah but so are most connectors.
As a 'hack' for programming a Mini Pro I push 6-way pin header into the end and then apply pressure with my fingers to slant the connector and keep it in contact with the thru-holes. Fortunately the impedance of my fingers isn't too low to disrupt the programming process(!)
I've also used the same hack for testing by pushing header pin rows into a breadboard spaced too far apart, then angled them to jam into the Mini Pro's side holes - not a very satisfactory solution, but saves premature soldering.
In theory it ought to be possible to make some spring-loaded pins by finding tiny springs that just fit over header pins - glue the springs at their base to the plastic and then insert into PCB holes and push down to compress the spring against the pad. Finding springs with a diameter of 1.5mm or so might be difficult!
These pins are spring loaded and $0.70 http://www.farnell.com/datasheets/38286.pdf
But still not sure if working them into some sort of plug that I suppose you should then wedge onto the board would be a nice solution - especially not with off-grid holes such as A4 and A5.
I've come to think of the Mini, Mini Pro and Nano to be more of a final unit to build into the built prototype/product after building with an ordinary unit (Uno etc).
Would you not be better building a breadboard based Arduino or Really Bare Bones (I think that's what it's called) unit to prototype? You could then use that to simply program the Mini Pro when you're ready to build it into the final project?
Just curious to the possibility - also, or perhaps even more so for the connection on boards or devices for the Mini Pro to connect to. I sometimes find myself soldering in short pins to later find out I need long ones.
By the way, does anyone know the pin hole diameter of the arduino boards, about 1mm?
Pretty much 1mm, possibly 1.1mm, based on comparison with the inter-pad spacing of 2.54mm
I also wondered about temporary connections.
I looked at wirewrapping, (very old tech, but then so am I !!).
Anyone have any experience of this? Preferably cheaply!
Regards,
gvnmcknz
Just the special tool to do wirewrap will probably cost more than a breadboard...
Radio Shack one for sale on t2retail site (via Google Shopping) £6.50 +p&p.
Might be worth a try at that price?
gvnmcknz
Radio Shack wirewrap tool gets good feedback on their site.
Helpful tutorial video at
I've ordered one, will let you know how it goes.
gvnmcknz
This looks promising...
http://www.ladyada.net/make/pogojig/index.html