Stripping cables with a lighter Pro Preview

We need to extend the cables to be able to connect them to our Raspberry PI. We must also add new connectors at the end of the cables.

  • #744
  • 23 Feb 2018
  • 4:44

TL. DR.

Burn about 1-2 centimetres of the insulator. Burn with a lighter.

Cable is conductor with an insulator

A cable is made of a conductor and an insulator. We must strip off the insulator and leave only the conductor to allow for the extension of the cable. On the picture below we have all the cables and you can see how part of the cables have the conductor visible at the end.

This is the result we would like to achieve.

Burning with a lighter

The cables and the conductor in the cables are very fragile. If you try to remove the insulator with scissors or a knife you will most probably cut the conductor in the process. The easiest way that we've found is to burn the end of the cable with a lighter.

Here is the lighter. Just a normal, simple lighter will do.

Here is how to burn the cables

English

We've removed the default controller of the car and now we would like to place our own controller - in this case the Raspberry Pi. And to be able to do this we must connect these cables with this controller but it's very inconvenient to use these cables. That's why in the set we've prepared cables with some special extensions and it is very convenient to use these cables because we can just plug them on the pins very easily like this. This is something we cannot do with the default cables that are on the car. That's why we need to prepare these cables and to extend them and to attach them with the cables from the set to be able to use them. And this is something that we're going to do in this tutorial. First step is to burn about 1-2 cm or an inch of the insulator and we should burn them with a lighter. Now, a cable is a conductor with an insulator. A cable is made of a conductor and an insulator. We must strip off the insulator and leave only the conductor to allow for the extension of the cable. How do we do this? We use a lighter. The cables and the conductor in the cables are very fragile. If you try to remove them for example with scissors, you'll cut the conductor. And this is not what we are trying to do here. The easiest way that we've found is to burn the end of the cable with a lighter. You take the lighter. You start it and you burn

about a centimeter right here - 1-2 cm. And let's do the same thing for the rest of the cables. I've zoomed in on the camera and you can see the end result right here. We have the insulator and the conductor and now we can extend this cable. Let's do the same for the rest of the cables. You take this one - the red one and we burn

about 1-2 cm. Don't touch it of course when it is hot because you might burn yourself. The next cable.

Now, when this happens you can just wait for it to cool down and try to remove it. It's difficult so let's burn it again.

Here it is this white band right here. Beautiful 1-2 cm of clear conductor. So, we have these and we need the blue one and the green one for the back motor. Be careful of course not to start a fire that's why we say that this course is for 13+ because at the end you must use a lighter. This part of the car is ready. Let's continue with the upper part of the car.

This one is kind of inconvenient. This is the antenna and I will not use it.

Next one coming in. Don't put your fingers below because a hot part from the conductor might fall on your finger.

And I think this is it. We have the car prepared and all the cables are stripped so that we can extend them with a heat shrinking tube.

Courses and lessons with this Tutorial

This Tutorial is used in the following courses and lessons

Image for Perfect STEM course. Module 1 - Smart Car with Raspberry PI
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