Trying to solder buttons, raspberry.

Other Hardware General Electronics
1

Hi,

ive been trying to resolder a SNES USB contoller board to fit into a handheld console with my old raspberry.
So now i cut the pcb and want to solder the buttons to it.
But i have never done something like this before and Im really not sure if its gonna work. I made some pics for you on how i am planning on soldering the buttons. Maybe you can take a look, check if its correct or maybe give me some advice.
here are the pics.

I know that there is a tutorial on adafruit, but my pcb looks kinda different. Especially that i cant find 1 common ground on each pcb, but have to use at least 2. I dont even know if thats gonna work :smiley: . Wish i had a multimeter...Gonna buy one on tuesday....

thanks for you help!

2

or wait....do i have to solder to the plue part? :smiley:

like this?

3

The blue part is soldermask over fiberglass PCB, solder will not stick to that.
You need to find something metallic to solder to.
Can you use a push button with a couple of wires as probes and experiment with where to connect to before you start soldering?

4

yeah, suppose i could try that.
But even if i figure out where to solder....How do i solder to something thats not possible to solder to? :smiley:
Ive been trying to copy this: Adafruit Learning System
they seem to be able to solder? or is it a different kind of material?
Or should i solder to the dark blue? Arghh Im confused xD

5

In that adafuit example it looks like they just sanded or scratched the solder mask off exposing a small patch of bare metal, Then they soldered to that.

The lighter blue area has metal below the solder mask, the darker blue area does not. If you scratched down through the dark blue areas you will just find fiberglass.

6

ah perfect, scratching works!

gonna think a bit more about where to solder the buttons now.

thanks guys!

7

Use a flat bladed screwdriver (in good condition) of the right size as a miniature chisel to remove the mask only where you wish to connect.

8

Hey,

I had some time yesterday and finished soldering everything.
Worked quite well......besides one thing :smiley:

After I conneceted the IDE Cable to the GPIO Pins my raspberry didnt turn on anymore.

I disconnected the IDE and it turned on perfectly....
so with IDE it wont boot, without it will.

any ideas how that can be possible?

Its a 40pin IDE on my 40 pin B+

9

Well, you know the answer to that, don't you?

10

Given your lack of reply I assume you don't know what is wrong.

Most likely you have got a short between the 5V or 3V3 pin on the Raspberry Pi and ground.