Hello Readers,

I am starting to wire up my pump and system, and have been thinking it is about time I learn a bit of a more professional way of doing this sort of thing over the “meh, it will work” style you can get away with on more short term projects (ie. below).  Apologies for the horrible quality of these pictures, the lighting in my lab isn’t ideal for this sort of thing.

So I turned to my all knowing mechatronics friends/YouTube, and have found this way of doing a much cleaner job.  Incase you have never done this sort of thing, I am using a soldering iron, solder, heat shrink, and a heat gun, which leads to *drum roll*:

Isn’t it pretty?! Ok, here’s how you do it.

Step 1:

Thread a piece of heat shrink onto your wire.  You can buy this in pre-cut pieces or as a roll from DigiKey.  Push the heat shrink down the wire as far as you can as the heat from soldering can make it shrink before you want it to.

Step 2:

Strip the ends of the two wires you want to join.  I stripped off about a centimeter at the most.

Step 2:

Push the ends of the wire together and twist a little bit (once or twice around maximum).

At this point I also bend the wire so the two ends to join is up in the air, which makes soldering it a lot easier.

Step 3:

Place the soldering iron under the exposed wire.  Hold the solder on the top of the wire and wait for the heat from the soldering iron to melt the solder. Realize nothing is happening, turn the soldering iron on, and repeat.

This way of doing it really does make a lot stronger of a joint.  I had been touching the solder right to the soldering iron to melt it (hey, its faster!) but today I tried both, and I could hardly break the “slow” one when pulled, while the fast way was really easy to pull apart.

Step 4:

Move the heat shrink over the joint, and heat with a heat gun (or blow-dryer) until its really tight, and you’re done!

Look how great the wires connecting to my power supply look! Love it!