A bit of soldering help

[jackcust]

I need to connect the socket of a keypad to a prototyping shield. I was planning to simply solder a male header to the shield, then connect those points to the correct inputs. But I can't fit hookup wire into the same holes the header goes through.

I haven't been working with PCBs for very long and I imagine there is an easy solution. Perhaps I can form a joint between the hookup wire and the header without the wire passing through the hole? But I'm not sure if that's a good idea.

I should mention - this Arduino+shield is going into a small enclosure, so I can't attach a breadboard or anything. The connections have to be made directly to the shield. And I can't take advantage of that series of 3 connected wells, because the keypad socket has to come in from a certain direction.

[adafruit_support_rick]

But I can't fit hookup wire into the same holes the header goes through.

A picture might help. But what sort of hookup wire are you using that it won't fit into a header hole? Sounds like your wire is much too heavy. Most people use 22AWG wire.

[jackcust]

A picture might help. But what sort of hookup wire are you using that it won't fit into a header hole? Sounds like your wire is much too heavy. Most people use 22AWG wire.

Thanks - I have that wire, and it fits through the holes in the shield - but not through a hole that I am also sticking a male header pin through. (I suspect I'm going about this unusually.)

[adafruit_support_bill]

A typical prototyping technique is to pass it through an adjacent hole, then bend it over to bridge with the header pin. Solder in both places for a secure joint.

[jackcust]

A typical prototyping technique is to pass it through an adjacent hole, then bend it over to bridge with the header pin. Solder in both places for a secure joint.

Sorry to be annoying, but I'm not exactly sure what you mean...

[adafruit_support_rick]

Thusly:

header pin.jpg (10.55 KiB) Viewed 1101 times

[jackcust]

Thank you! It seems to have worked well.

[adafruit_support_rick]

Cool
Thanks for the opportunity to display my awesome artistic chops!