How A Broken Or Bridged Trace Occurs, How would a trace break or lift exactly Options

[tmoney_man]

I was wondering how a broken trace occurs. What do people do wrong for this to happen. I'm asking these questions to prevent this from happenng to me. I understand how to solder to the D0 and other points, but If that is all I'm doing, then how I could I break or lift a trace? Thanks

This post has been edited by tmoney_man: Sep 3 2005, 09:53 PM

[Statecowboy]

It can happen a number of ways. The most common I believe is too much heat applied to the trace or a via will heat the material to a state that it simply melts or burns in half. Another mistake can happen if someone accidentally scrapes the conformal coating applied to the board off and physically lifts it on accident by scraping something against it (unlikely, but possible).

A trace is just a very thin copper wire covered by a conformal coating. Don't apply too much heat and be patient with your soldering and you won't have to worry about making a mistake. If you do make a mistake it's not the end of the world. You can always jumper the two burnt ends together (requires some skill, but not impossible).

[tmoney_man]

It can happen a number of ways.  The most common I believe is too much heat applied to the trace or a via will heat the material to a state that it simply melts or burns in half.  Another mistake can happen if someone accidentally scrapes the conformal coating applied to the board off and physically lifts it on accident by scraping something against it (unlikely, but possible). 

A trace is just a very thin copper wire covered by a conformal coating.  Don't apply too much heat and be patient with your soldering and you won't have to worry about making a mistake.  If you do make a mistake it's not the end of the world.  You can always jumper the two burnt ends together (requires some skill, but not impossible).

Thanks for the help...If I'm soldering just to the D0 though, I shouldn't be applying to much heat, because I'm just heating the wire, and not the D0 itself, right?

[Statecowboy]

Well you should be heating both things together otherwise you might get a cold joint (where the solder doesnt flow onto the piece you want to solder, it just melts around it). This will work most of the time, but it isn't a good method of soldering.