Problem: Need Help

[runamuck]

I am building 2 J99s. While soldering in some of the resistors, a tiny amount of solder found its way into the left pole of R12 before I had placed that resistor in there.

I tried melting it back out with the iron and was unable to do so.

So I attempted to remove the solder with a very small drill bit, twirling the bit slowly by hand. It worked, but at the same time I inadvertantly removed some of the metal in the circuit board that the resitor lead should be soldered to.

I attempted to solder the R12 resistor in place but am worried that I may not have a good connection.

How would I go about testing this?

And Tim, if you are reading this, if I have blown it, is it possible to buy another circuit board or do you sell it only in kit form?

I had installed most of the components on my first board with total success and then got overconfident and cocky in starting in on the second.

I have been knocked down a few pegs and am quite embarrassed about this.


Thanks for your help.


Jim

[dkatz42]

It sounds like most likely you removed the through-plating in the hole, which connects the two sides of the circuit board together. No problem; just make sure that the lead is soldered to both sides of the board, and the lead will act in place of the plating.

All this assumes that you didn't remove foil from the neighborhood of the pad.

A simple test would be to take an ohmmeter and ensure that the resistor lead shows 0 ohms to each of the places it connects to (follow the schematic or simply eyeball the foil traces, or both.)

In a real pinch you could tack in a small wire to replace the damaged path if it no longer works.


BTW, in this situation, rather than trying to remove the solder from the hole, the simplest thing to do would have been to heat the solder blob while inserting the resistor into the hole.


Lots of options...

[tpryan]

What dkatz said. You could also have removed the solder using wick or a solder sucker, both of which you should get before your next project.