The Benefits of Impatience and Ignorance [COLUG]

[Jim]

On Sat, 07 Apr 2007 17:21:14 -0400 "Andrew J. Barr" <andrew.james.barr at gmail.com> wrote:

> Jim wrote:
...
> > Of course, impatience and ignorance have their benefits. 
> > Particularly, that you got a free laptop. 
> 
> And now it's a free *working* laptop. 

Cool! Congratulations! 

> ... but through a combination 
> of thinking outside the box and dumb luck, 

It wasn't dumb luck. It was common sense. 

> I had the idea to insert some small strips of printer paper below the 
> ribbon cable to push it up against the connectors (which I correctly 
> believed were on the top of the socket. 

Way to go! 

I would have used clear plastic and plastic coated cardboard 
from blister packs, and would have measured the correct thickness 
from the old crumbs that you saved, to know how thick to make the 
new shim/wedge. 

BTW, your terminus terminology is terminal. The connector 
is the piece of plastic that holds the little metal pieces, and those 
little metal pieces. I.e., the connector is the whole thing. 
Where those metal pieces touch the flexible flat 
cable, are called contacts. Some female connectors or contacts are 
called sockets. For example, the female contact in a sub-miniature 
D connector is traditionally called a socket, but the contacts in your 
connector only touch on one side, so I would not call those contacts 
sockets (and you did not). You could call the whole connector a 
socket (as you did), but it sounds odd. Terminology can be idiomatic. 

> This worked, and for good 
> measure there are a few small pieces of duct tape up over top of the 
> connection to keep the assembly in place 

Duct tape (aka rally tape, aka 100mph tape, aka 500mph tape) is great 
for temporary stuff. For use longer than a few days, I recommend that 
you _gently_ remove it and all of the residue of its adhesive soon. 
VM&P naphtha on Q-tips or bits of paper towel is good for removing 
_fresh_ adhesive residue. 

The tape is probably unnecessary. Most such connectors are not taped 
over for retention, because the locking action of the connector is 
designed to provide significant retention. If you still feel the urge to add 
tape, use a high quality tape. It is a difficult for many adhesives 
to resist degradation and creep, in the heat of a laptop. 

> So the question now is, is there any reason for me to bring it to lunch? 

To brag, to bask in the few wireless connection there. 
To hang out with geeks of various media. 
To see how similar connectors are made and work 
and how to disassemble them to pirate parts from. 
To see how to buy connectors to get the proper locking wedge from 
to replace the missing wedge of your connectors. 
To ask Charlie to bring his Mouser catalog. 

BTW, I would _still_ hang onto the old plastic crumbs of the connector. 

The set of five eye loupes at Harbor Freight is item #47995 there. 

Jim