[sidi_steve]

Hey projector peeps...

I am working on a different project at the moment. a Laser engraver. Uses 40w CO2 laser and motion is controlled via Houston Instruments plotter. pen up and pen down = laser off and laser on.

ok - I was hoping to move some of the circuitry further away from where the laser is going to be. Bought a 10 foot roll of ffc cable. One end was properly prepared, ya know with the 14 silver conductors bare and ready for contact. I have tried to prep the other end, but to no avail.

Anyone know how to properly prep the end of an ffc cable?

Thanks

Steve

[Housemachine]

sidi_steve, on Nov 28 2006, 03:30 AM, said:

Hey projector peeps...

I am working on a different project at the moment. a Laser engraver. Uses 40w CO2 laser and motion is controlled via Houston Instruments plotter. pen up and pen down = laser off and laser on.

ok - I was hoping to move some of the circuitry further away from where the laser is going to be. Bought a 10 foot roll of ffc cable. One end was properly prepared, ya know with the 14 silver conductors bare and ready for contact. I have tried to prep the other end, but to no avail.

Anyone know how to properly prep the end of an ffc cable?

Thanks

Steve

Well, I don' t have any experience on FCC cables, but based on forum readings; I can say that "These are very very sensitive materials." I mean modifying them will cause no image at all or wavy picture.

This post has been edited by Housemachine: 27 November 2006 - 11:46 PM

[sidi_steve]

Just wanted to report a bit of success...

I took my 14 conductor cable out to the grinder (yes, "elegant", i know.) I placed the side I want to prep up against the wheel and used a piece of aluminum to provide very light but even pressure against the grinding wheel while I was slowly moving the cable and aluminum slowly left and right across the wheel.

This made the leading mm VERY ugly and chewed up, but I got a nice 5 or 6mm section behind that, which appeared rather evenly stripped. So I just used scissors to trim off the first 1.5mm, leaving me with a "nice" (ok, not that nice) stripped cable.

This was now too thin for the connector, but I built up the back side of the cable with some tape. It now fits nicely in the connector.

Then of course was the test. I turned on the plotter and at first, everything worked well, meaning it tried to perform its homing function. The motors were moving, but when the x axis got home, the motors kept turning.

Well, at least the cable was getting juice to the motors.

I turned the unit off, pulled the cable, cleaned it just a bit and shoved it back in. Turned it back on and this time it works.

Only problem is that I did all that on a test piece of cable to see if it would work. Now I gotta make a longer cable and do it again.

At least that step worked!

If anyone has a better technique, I am all ears

Thanks

Steve