I’ll try and keep this as concise as possible:
I’ve re-soldered approximately 20 wire connections by now in my saber, whether it’s on a pad or splicing two wires together (since wire breaks mean I have to cut off a portion)
Essentially, I would like to know if there are any ways to reduce the twisting of wires or anything I can do so that I don’t have to take apart my saber practically every other day. I feel like it could potentially be a result of me unscrewing the switch and body section far to often just to flip the kill switch every night, but I have no other choice as my switch section has two openings— one for my single switch, and the other for a USB-C recharge/data transfer port.
I have tried the following:
Adding hot glue as a way of stabilizing the wire connections to the pads
Using heat shrink whenever I splice two wires
Pre-twisting the wires so that when I screw the two saber parts together the wires are (more likely than not) to be straight
why are there wires twisting with opening?
does the grip have things connected to it? or does the grip not unscrew, or…?
got pics?
Sounds like you need a multipin rotary pogo pin connector where your whatever sections are joined by wires that are twisting.
Honestly after you mentioned the multipin rotary pogo connector I realize why it existed…
Basically I have everything hardwired to each other, and that would be why the wires twist because there are some parts (neopixel connector, recharge port, switch) that are stationary.
When I ordered the electronics for my saber I skipped over getting a rotary chassis connector because I thought it would be unnecessary, since I didn’t plan on taking the electronics out often.
As for your question about the grip section, I built my saber using hilt parts from Saberforge, so aside from the “saber chassis” that holds the proffieboard, battery, and speaker, there’s nothing that actually covers the wires.
I’m aware that my description could be pretty awful so I’ll try and send pictures of my saber when I get home from work.
One simple thing that can help a lot is to use flexible wires. This usually means “silicone wire”, which uses silicone instead of plastic for the insulator. Silicone can also handle high temperatures, which prevents melting and shrinking during soldering.
Without completely taking everything apart, that’s an idea of what my saber looks like. I know it’s messy, it’s my first saber, and honestly a lot of the mess is from wire repairs. I currently have a chassis being printed at the moment that I designed specifically for my hilt. If all goes well, hopefully I can use a rotary pcb and resolve this issue.
I’m still very open to any suggestions because I’m still apprehensive about pulling the trigger on buying electronics.
The other alternative would be to figure out a better kill switch situation.
Havin a cable mess inside is fine if you never have to see it or touch it.
If you have a recharge port, you already have a killswitch.
Just stick a dummy plug in there (a “kill key”) instead of having a separate switch.
Then again, I guess it depends on what kind of port it is. Typically for saber use, you’d get one that has a built in switch that connects either the battery to the plug (inserted) or the battery to a third leg (the board) when nothing is plugged in.
If you have a 2 conductor recharge port that doesn’t help your situation.
Yeah unfortunately that doesn’t apply in my situation. I have a USB-C port hooked up to a charging module so that’s my form of both data transfer and charging.
Good news (or I hope so), I successfully printed out a custom chassis and since I get my electronics from SaberBay, I’m on the lookout to see what their next week’s sales are on. Regardless, I’ll get the electronics I need soon and should be able to see if my kill switch configuration works or not.
