connector hell

Kyocera used to make a flip-phone. Maybe they got carried away with the whole flip thing? :)

Connector drawings are uniformly terrible. Enclosure drawings are about as bad. We use an IP67 diecast Bud box for some of our fire detection products, and Bud's drawings are horrible. Fortunately, one of their distributors, Polycase, has very nice .stp files for them, and also offers very reasonably-priced machining, online instant quotes, and other goodies.

For connectors we all have to get a few and measure them. :(

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

I don't see anything on the drawing that would make me think this was the bottom view. What am I missing?

I got bit with a TI data sheet 2 or 3 years ago, It was a LM4040, TI had the pins reversed. Some jerk had swapped the pins in the Revision I gave the Board guy. They were nice enough to fix it and bump the revision after I sent an email to correct it.

Cheers

The dashed lines of the conector body. Thats what we use for bottom mounted components on the top silk screen.

Cheers

d_RA-TH.pdf?dl=0

e bottom view. What am I missing?

That seems pretty thin for indication of top/bottom in a drawing by someone else. Looking at the rest of the drawings I would have thought it was lik e the one at the top of the page, but in lieu of something explicit I would not have made any assumption.

Winfield Hill wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@drn.newsguy.com:

The note "insert direction" was no hint?

The American convention for showing views on a drawing is opposite to the European one (of course).

The position of views in an American drawing is as though you were sliding the part around inside a bowl. On that convention, Win's right--the view he marked in red ought to be the top view.

In a European drawing, the views are positioned as though you were sliding the parts on the _outside_ of the bowl (i.e. on a convex surface). On that convention the marked view is the bottom.

It's always nice when manufacturers label a couple of the views so you can figure out which convention is being used.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Fortunately I found the problem in time; the PCB house has not started the work, and I can replace the file. Yes, as many have pointed out, the view should have been obvious. Going by the dark pin circles and dashed outline, and ignoring its orientation, was careless. Going ahead without checking against an actual connector, was dangerous.

Winfield Hill wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@drn.newsguy.com:

Dangerous? Well... financially, I suppose.

Yeah... a lesson we should all note in 'good practice' methodology.

But just like we know that doctors are just 'practicing' till they get it right, We learn, sometimes only, through practice.

That doesn't tell you a thing about which view you are looking at.

ond_RA-TH.pdf?dl=0

I suppose conventions are like standards, everybody should have one.

But really, that was the first thing I looked at and it is easy to see this is not in force here since you can't get these drawings from either of the two conventions. The top and bottom drawings show the outline to be the s ame, so clearly a bowl is not involved. Either the top drawing and the bot tom drawing are the same view, or the bottom drawing is flipped about the a xis of symmetry. Without information I would have contacted the manufactur er.

Yes, that's what I did, by purchasing connectors.

Actually, I like this connector. Even tho it's smaller than the competition, it has a nifty clamping action that (1) firmly holds the flex- strip in place, and (2) eliminates contact wear, when inserting or removing the flex-strip cable.

I'm glad you caught the issue in time.

cond_RA-TH.pdf?dl=0

When I look at the sheet I see

top view with logo and datum pin (what normally is called pin 1) marker

Next down is front view looking into the connector. Note datum pin is still on the left and X moves to the right based on the number of pins. To the right of this figure is a view looking into the right side of the connector showing the latching action.

Next figure shows board layout looking from the top. Note datum pin is still on the left

What I dont like about the far right figure showing the right side view is the 6.3 dimension is from the flat face of the front to the back of the connector. I dont see any dimension of how far the corner "bumps" extend from the front face. Also I dont see a dimension from the pin center (either front row or back row) to the front of the face. Pin diameter shows 0.4 so I guess 6.3 - 0.2 would be close to the face from the CL of the back row.

They also dont have a dimension from the connector bottom or top to the mated height of the ribbon cable.

As for Polycase, I am in the process of working with them right now on an enclosure modification. Also, we plan to work with them in the future for printing on the enclosure as well.

They are very professional, thorough, and diligent. They send a drawing to you for your approval based on their understanding of your requirements.

The phone is answered by a live person. No directory tree. What more can you ask?

I have no connection to them other than as a very satisfied customer.

John

You're right, the drawing is scrooched either way.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

The corner "bumps" as you call them are 6.6 mm from the reference point. Isn't that good enough?

Only approximate. The diagram does seem to show some space between the pin and the reference plane.

Same with many connectors. They give you the outside dimensions, but fail to provide info on how the connect to the other half so you can't mix brands with confidence.

My mistake. I missed that on the upper figure.