Difficulty soldering EC5 connectors? Possible reason.

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Sloclone100

Sloclone100

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Arrma RC's
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I have been in electronics for many years. I will not bore you with a resume but I can solder, that's my message. Those EC% connectors, although they look bulletproof a problem with a lot of people is soldering them. I have more than enough tools to do any soldering job but a lot of guys out there have nothing but 'pencil irons'. I'm saying you need a welder's torch, but you do need heat. With the EC5s' the soldering is pretty straight forward especially if you have a jig for connectors. Then the final 'snap-in' part, well, I don't always get a solid 'snap'. We are now dealing with much thicker wire on our batteries and ESCs'. When you solder that connector on, it has to be straight on and NO solder on the out side of the connector. Even that does not ensure you a clean snap.

But when you finally get that down, I noticed something weird while soldering a male connector on. The heat of my gun spread the connector's brass fingers apart and the male end would not go through. I don't know how I noticed but I used a tool to squeeze them in a bit and guess what? I got my 'snap'!

So if anybody is having the same problem, check this out. It is only for male connectors. HTH - Dave
 
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I am an XT90 guy. Only because I have many rigs and numerous Lipos invested with them. I always find my self changing out the EC5's. I reuse them for other projects however, and have soldered with them also. I use a Hot fat tip. 780F temps and I solder with both male and female attached. I try to solder very Quick. Too long and the bullets will spread/ move like you state. Less so if both ends are attached. EC5's solder differently compared to XT90's. A slight learning curve. I relate to what you say and is happening. Are you soldering while M/F connector are attached and using a clipon heat sink to the opposite side of leg/bullet you are soldering?
Just some ideas. I have been soldering for 30 years in this hobby and in general. I see you are familiar as well. Have you checked out videos soldering the EC5's? I did and see there are differing techniques that people have.
Just my ideas. :cool:

Edit: I have seen 2 different types of EC5's. Some that have bullets that snap in from the front, and some from the rear. Takes a very close eye to see which way the bullets snap in from. Front or rear. Done wrong, the bullets don't align well and don't snap in place. They can push out with just one disconnect or push. I feel they are more time consuming to work with compared to XT90's. I have seen some solder the bullets first then insert/snap in place, and some solder after. I don't know more. I know there is a specific tool made to insert the bullets. Optional, FWIW. Maybe you know this?
 
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My top tip is always plug male/female into each other no matter what you are soldering, helps with heat transfer etc etc....
On a side note I struggled with 8mm bullets first time I tried them, then I saw a video using a mini gas torch for the final join and it works perfectly 👍🏼

I have been soldering most of my life on and off over the years 😁 oh and don't even start me on how hard EC5 plugs are to snap the covers on 🤣🤣

I'm about to convert my whole fleet to XT150's apart from my speed cars they will stay 8mm bullets.

Below is the vid I mention, thanks aka Brandon..!!

 
SrC said:
I am an XT90 guy. Only because I have many rigs and numerous Lipos invested with them. I always find my self changing out the EC5's. I reuse them for other projects however, and have soldered with them also. I use a Hot fat tip. 780F temps and I solder with both male and female attached. I try to solder very Quick. Too long and the bullets will spread/ move like you state. Less so if both ends are attached. EC5's solder differently compared to XT90's. A slight learning curve. I relate to what you say and is happening. Are you soldering while M/F connector are attached and using a clipon heat sink to the opposite side of leg/bullet you are soldering?
Just some ideas. I have been soldering for 30 years in this hobby and in general. I see you are familiar as well. Have you checked out videos soldering the EC5's? I did and see there are differing techniques that people have.
Just my ideas. :cool:

Edit: I have seen 2 different types of EC5's. Some that have bullets that snap in from the front, and some from the rear. Takes a very close eye to see which way the bullets snap in from. Front or rear. Done wrong, the bullets don't align well and don't snap in place. They can push out with just one disconnect or push. I feel they are more time consuming to work with compared to XT90's. I have seen some solder the bullets first then insert/snap in place, and some solder after. I don't know more. I know there is a specific tool made to insert the bullets. Optional, FWIW. Maybe you know this?
Click to expand...
PLEASE tell me what it is with the videos that show snap from the rear, some that snap from the front, I am not doing anything until I get more advise, and SrC, I'm digging what I'm hearing from you buddy, Anything else?
 
BashingBrian said:
My top tip is always plug male/female into each other no matter what you are soldering, helps with heat transfer etc etc....
On a side note I struggled with 8mm bullets first time I tried them, then I saw a video using a mini gas torch for the final join and it works perfectly 👍🏼

I have been soldering most of my life on and off over the years 😁 oh and don't even start me on how hard EC5 plugs are to snap the covers on 🤣🤣

I'm about to convert my whole fleet to XT150's apart from my speed cars they will stay 8mm bullets.

Below is the vid I mention, thanks aka Brandon..!!

Click to expand...
XT150 are awesome and the way forward imo, buy battery side and esc side and you can series link them all day long without any additional connectors/adaptors
 
I've got many years of soldering experience back when we used to do electronic repair but have been away from that for a few years now. Soldering up an EC5 jumper recently reminded me of working on a circuit board where you're desoldering a ground. The ground in some circuits usually has A LOT more mass compared to everything else since it usually is heavier in gauge and runs all over the board so it acts as a heatsink robbing all the heat power of your iron, particularly if you're using a small iron tip which doesn't have a lot of mass. This is also where your iron or station needs to have some decent wattage.

Chisel tips are a must for that or when soldering these heavy duty battery cables. Also note that the wire in these harnesses act as solder wick and will pull gobs of solder into the wire if you sit there and feed it in causing the wire to become rigid.

Use solder with lead in it, desoldering parts on boards without leaded solder is rather unpleasant. Always tin whatever you're going to join, the end of wire and the posts you solder to. Do NOT blow on hot solder to cool it and improvise something to hold the wires you're soldering if they are thick like battery cables. The little "helper hands" alligator clips are great it for this.
 
This is my soldering setup. As with others, plenty of experience in the past.

For rear inserting EC3 / EC5 connectors, these assembly punches are amazing and do the job quickly and effectively:

E50BDD15-B188-4A8B-9737-1E941E3B8068.jpeg
 
kavax said:
I've got many years of soldering experience back when we used to do electronic repair but have been away from that for a few years now. Soldering up an EC5 jumper recently reminded me of working on a circuit board where you're desoldering a ground. The ground in some circuits usually has A LOT more mass compared to everything else since it usually is heavier in gauge and runs all over the board so it acts as a heatsink robbing all the heat power of your iron, particularly if you're using a small iron tip which doesn't have a lot of mass. This is also where your iron or station needs to have some decent wattage.

Chisel tips are a must for that or when soldering these heavy duty battery cables. Also note that the wire in these harnesses act as solder wick and will pull gobs of solder into the wire if you sit there and feed it in causing the wire to become rigid.

Use solder with lead in it, desoldering parts on boards without leaded solder is rather unpleasant. Always tin whatever you're going to join, the end of wire and the posts you solder to. Do NOT blow on hot solder to cool it and improvise something to hold the wires you're soldering if they are thick like battery cables. The little "helper hands" alligator clips are great it for this.
Click to expand...
I used to work wit PCBs' and yes, I have burned a ground, or two.
 
Sloclone100 said:
Do you see? They actually had to make a special tool to push these suckers together. I don't like it. I bet there are automotive connectors that would work, and probably way cheaper.

Thanks for your reply, Dave
Click to expand...

Maybe I'm missing something but insertion (and extraction) tools are not unique to EC5-type connectors. Not absolutely necessary but they do make life easier - and I'm all about easy.
 
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