Soldering in headers on LE

[Christmasaddict]

I tried to get an anwer to this in the chat room but apparently no one is chatting...  I am ready to solder in the 2 two pin and 1 six pin header on my LE board.  Do I solder in the short pins or the long pins.

[ponddude]

The short pins go into the board, with the long pins sticking up.

A little trick I use when I solder them is to take the jumpers that are in the kit and place them over the pins.  It gives you a little insulation so you can hold them and not get burned.  I usually start on the pin that is furthest away just to hold it in place.  Of course, that isn't the easiest with the 2 pin headers...hence putting the jumper in.   

[vairmoose]

what I've found to work (most of the time)  is to use a small square of the foam used in the packing of the various chips.   place the pins in place (all of them)  then push the foam down.    turn the board over and one last visual check for squareness.......  and solder all in place.   

Larry

[austindave]

My technique is to squeeze the outside two short pins toward each other - just a tiny bit - before inserting them. Once they're squoze, it's a little more difficult to insert them (you get one end in then push diagonally to get the last one in), but they'll hold themselves in place while you solder them.

That seems to work pretty well for me.

--Dave

[Rainlover]

squoze?
I did the same as Dave. Worked great.

John

[austindave]

What? Is it supposed to be squozed instead? Or maybe squozen... I can never keep those straight...

Oh, yeah, and there's one thing that you need to be careful of - the pins will slide in or out of the plastic block, especially when they're hot. So if you solder the header in askew, be really careful when straightening it out - you need to push on both the header block and the pin(s) you want to move. If you heat it up & only push on the pin (making the assumption that the block will push down with the pin), you may be surprised to find the the pin pushing through the header & the board (ask me how I know this! )

--Dave

[lineman]

I just use the blue tape and push the pins thru the tape and then solder