All the headers (except for power) on the Orangutan board are female. Other boards I’ve dealt with (including some of Pololu’s, like the servo controller) use male headers. So I find myself with a bunch of sensors and effectors that already have female headers on the ends of their cables, and no good way to connect them to the Pololu board.
Does anyone know of an adapter that would let me join two female connectors? I imagine this would look something lie a bare male header, but with long pins on both ends. I could do this with a couple of short solid-core wires, but I don’t think it would be very reliable.
Barring that, what do y’all recommend? Should I try to desolder the female headers on the board and replace them with male ones? (Note that I’m not too experienced with desoldering.) Or just cut the connectors off of all my peripherals and replace them with male ones? Or some other clever solution I haven’t thought of?
I know there is such a thing as male headers that are long on both sides (extra long on one so that the pins sticking out of the board on both sides are fairly equivalent), but I would go for the desoldering solution.
I actually like the female headers, since I use my big Orangutan mostly for quick testing, and I can press breadboard wires right into them. When I’m actually integrating a micro into something, it’s usually a baby orangutan, or an AVR I put on its own board.
I use the extra long male headers when I’m plugging servos into the Orangutan. It does work, but it’s not something I’d throw into a robot and plop into an arena. It’s a shaky connection.
All my other sensors I went ahead and stuck male headers on them so they can plug right in.
Adam, it’s good to know I’m not the only one plugging breadboard wires into my Orangutan. It really is handy for that.
I also like the female headers on the Orangutan because it’s hard to accidentally short out your power pins. Same reason I like the male header on the battery connection. It lets me use a female plug on the battery so it’s hard to short it out when it’s unplugged.
OK, it’s serious newbie-question time. Can you tell me the actual part number for the male headers you used, and describe how you managed to solder (or crimp?) wires to them?
I have some male Molex KK headers, but they’re designed to go into a circuit board; I don’t see how I could get a reliable joint trying to solder wires to them directly.
My solution’s kinda old-school and not that pretty. Fred Martin’s 6.270 and Miniboard manual had instructions for making male headers:
You get some strip header, same as you’d solder into a board. Snap off the length you want (3 pins) and solder your wires directly to the board-side of the pins. Put heat shrink over your solder joints. That’s it.
The strip header I got is just 0.100" spacing strip header from Digikey or Mouser. I forget the part number, but it’s your run-of-the-mill header. I think it comes in 8" lengths or something. I kinda crank through it, so I try to keep it on-hand.
I do the same, and I don’t bother with heatshrink if I’m just making a quick wiring harness I don’t expect to be using for long (and yes, the wires do break after a short while). I don’t think there is such a thing as crimp-on male headers.
Jameco doesn’t appear to be selling them right now, but the part you’re looking for is #145357CJ, the male crimp pin, pictured on jameco.com/Jameco/catalogs/c253/P121.pdf
