PCB Ribbon

[spencerikin]

Hi All

I have just purchased a Jaguar X300 and I’m having trouble with the LCD clock not showing all the sections of all the digits.

Now there are various different types fixes on the Jaguar Forums, but they don’t appear to cover the main issue of connection the ribbon to the PCB. This is where I believe the problem with my clock occurs. See photo for details.

So can anyone tell me how to connect the ribbon to the board?

I look forward to your help.

Spencer

[Monkeh]

How was it attached originally?

[mikeselectricstuff]

This is a heat-seal connection - you _may_ be able to re-fix with a careful press with a soldering iron at the right temp but high risk of damage and may not last.
I think these tend to be carbon or conductive polymer so probably not solderable - some small dots of conductive epoxy might do it but high risk of shorts.

 

[Monkeh]

Is there room to get a ZIF connector in there?

[pickle9000]

I have used conductive grease, silver ink and conductive epoxy. The grease is preferred for beginners because you can redo easily. Place only a minimal amount of the grease on the contact. To keep it in place a small piece of aluminum over the flexible part of the connector with double sided sticky tape clamped into position and then epoxied at the 2 outside edges. The clamping needs to be minimal. To redo you simply cut the epoxy. You need to use a good quality epoxy (like JB weld). If you use too much it will ooze over to the other contact points and you will have to start over.   

The silver ink is probably a longer lasting solution, it can also be redone but is not as simple as the grease because no cable movement is allowed. The grease could be a problem with a "printed" connector because in theory the grease can dissolve the contact point over long periods. Circuit Works makes very good quality ink, a pen will cost about 30-40 dollars. It's real silver and thus expensive (apply with a tiny brush). I mainly use it for repairing expensive microphones and guitar pickups (reattaching wires). For that it's excellent. It can be dissolved with acetone if you need to start over. Grease was designed to reduce switch bounce in mechanical switches, equally expensive. Touchpad repair kits are also billed as "conductive ink" however in this case I would not use that because it may have a resistive quality that will kill the repair.

BTW a connector on the board would probably not work even if you could get it to fit. Solder on the cable will kill the clamping action. Trying to desolder or resolder the cable is a crap shoot and I never gamble if I can help it.

...mike   

[spencerikin]

Hi Guys

Thank you for the helpful advise.

I'm liking the idea of a ZIF connection. However I had to google it to find out what it was lol. How do I go about fitting one to a) the board and b) the ribbon.

Look forward to your comments.

Spencer

[PedroDiogo]

This is a heat-seal connection - you _may_ be able to re-fix with a careful press with a soldering iron at the right temp but high risk of damage and may not last.
I think these tend to be carbon or conductive polymer so probably not solderable - some small dots of conductive epoxy might do it but high risk of shorts.

 

Conductive epoxy gave me an idea.

Why don't you glue jumper wires to the ribbon cable with conductive epoxy and then solder them to the PCB ?
Low change of shorts, easy to do and if well secured can also be reliable.

[Spawn]

What’s up with Jag’s and their LCD screens? Had a LCD problem on a X-Type when I had one, that screen was a lot bigger but still.

Anyways, does that ribbon goes to the LCD itself directly on a Conductive Silicon connector, or is it connected same way as this side on your photo? If both sides are same as on the picture you could try a normal ribbon cable and drill holes on the PCB and solder the ribbon cable on it.
Could you take a picture from little bit more distance so we can see how it looks like on both sides?

There are some ebay stores fixing this issue like this one here by the way.