I recently purchased a klor from beekeeb, ready soldered :) excellent soldering job; in any case. I didn’t realise that the mcu would be exposed. So i was wondering if I should be worried. I don’t want to stick black electrical tape over it because it will get sticky. Wondering what i could do. Worried i move the keyboard one day with moisture on my fingers and then i get a short, which will be a sad day. Thanks.
Moisture from your skin will absolutely not affect it. Spilling a drink on your desk might cause problems, but even then I bet it would be fine if you dried it out.
I personally wouldn’t worry about it.
Use Silicone Conformal Coating. It’s a clear silicone liquid you can apply over the whole circuit board and it makes it waterproof while leaving the PCB visible. You can even do repairs on it with a solder iron (the coating melts under the iron). We use that for FPV drones.
You could use a hot glue gun. If you ever need to take it off, isopropyl alcohol will cause it to unstick without any damage.
This is a brand new piece of information to me, and a quick google says it’s right. This is useful.
lucky i have a hot glue gun; so must I just squeeze glue over the whole mcu? I do have splicing tape could i stick some down with hot glue?
You really only need to cover the pins.
You would spread it across the MCU. I’m not sure what the best way is to keep it perfectly smooth though. You could hide it with electrical tape if you really wanted to (is that what you mean by slicing tape?).
Electrical tape is a pain. It will work, but it’ll age and either get nasty-sticky or the adhesive will degrade eventually, still leaving a layer if nasty stuff on the MCU. It’s a crap shoot, depending on how it it was made.
Kapton tape (maybe?) or a 3D printed cover would be better.
If you want something permanent, some potting epoxy would work wonders. It’ll be messy and more expensive, but it won’t budge. Ever.
The last option I could think of that would be between tape and epoxy would be some common silicone sealant. You can get it clear, black and white colors easily. It’ll be a hair messy, but you can peel it off later.
I have basically stopped using electrical tape for electronics work unless I really don’t give a shit. At the end of the day, anything that would prevent a short between the pins on the MCU is a win.
Asked a similar question years ago and some suggested fingernail polish. Not sure how easy it would be to get off in case you must. Never tried it myself.
Plastidip should do the job elegantly if you manage to apply it cleanly enough.
Honestly a little moisture isn’t going to short it unless you’re setting it in a literal puddle. I really wouldn’t worry about it being exposed, it’s not really a problem. Something like electrical tape would protect you if you put something metal against it, but an amount of water that would cause problems isn’t going to be stopped by some tape.
The reset/boot part of the SEA-PICRO uses 4 MOSFETs, so that makes it a little more sensitive to ESD and short circuits. Covering it with something would be good since keyboards can move around more, are subject to more abuse and people who have hobbies like this are more likely to have bits of metal (or screws) on their desk.
I would generally agree with you about the exposed pins not being and issue, but for this application, a little more protection will go a long way.
I am not sure exactly how that kit goes together, but you can really use anything non conductive. If you take the back plate off you can use a vinyl sticker/tape of any kind. Once you put the back case back on it would do a nice job form fitting and staying even after the tape loses its stick.
