What happened to the Jaycar catalogue?

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sir1963

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#3205441 11-Mar-2024 15:59

MadEngineer:

What kind of plug? One of these?

You may require one of these tools that you clip on between the plastic and your work area. The tool then takes the heat instead of the plastic

Edit: 6 Piece Soldering Tool Kit | Jaycar Electronics New Zealand

Yep, that the plug.

Just plug it into a well made socket and it holds the pins in the exact right place while you solder it

richms

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#3205443 11-Mar-2024 16:05

They're all made of the lowest melting point junk plastic so spending more on an element 14 din plug achieves nothing to making them not have the pins move when soldering them. The backshells seem nicer with the decent sellers tho - the strain relief on the aliex or jaycar ones break before you have even got any use out of it IME.

The socket is a good idea but get an expendable one as I have had the pins become bad with the heat from soldering a plug when in them.

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MadEngineer

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#3205483 11-Mar-2024 19:07

What's your soldering technique? What wire are you using? What solder are you using?

Make sure you're heating the joint first with the iron before applying the solder to the join and not by melting it onto the iron expecting it to flow into the joint. There's also cheat method of applying solder to the two parts to be joined first ("tinning") then bringing them together and heating them again using the already applied solder. This may give you a quick (dirty + ugly) join but done incorrectly it'll likely develop problems in quick fashion.

I'll add that a solder join should never be relied on for physically holding things in place.

Sorry if you know all this already

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sir1963

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#3205494 11-Mar-2024 20:06

MadEngineer:

What's your soldering technique? What wire are you using? What solder are you using?

Make sure you're heating the joint first with the iron before applying the solder to the join and not by melting it onto the iron expecting it to flow into the joint. There's also cheat method of applying solder to the two parts to be joined first ("tinning") then bringing them together and heating them again using the already applied solder. This may give you a quick (dirty + ugly) join but done incorrectly it'll likely develop problems in quick fashion.

I'll add that a solder join should never be relied on for physically holding things in place.

Sorry if you know all this already

Yep...been servicing scientific equipment for 40 years.

Was just making some quick and dirty jumper plugs for hotplate stirrers, with the plug installed it will use the internal temp controller (rough), but you can also use an external digital controller with a Type-k thermocouple for much better control that plugs into that socket.

The jumper plugs go missing, so every few years we make some up. I had just forgotten how poor the ones from Jaycar are.

I will just order some decent ones from RS/Element 14 next time I need stuff.

JimmyH

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#3205501 11-Mar-2024 21:16

I used to visit Jaycar frequently and purchase quite a bit, but now I hardly ever shop there.

The search function on their website is poor, and in general I find their pricing pretty hard to swallow, not just compared to the likes of Aliexpress but compared to local options as well.

Case in point, I recently wanted a couple of sets of bog standard AA Eneloop rechargeable batteries recently. PB Tech has the 4-pack at $19.07 (on sale from their normal price of $20.41). Jaycar has the identical 4-pack at the low, low bargain price of $45.90. Guess where I didn't shop.

It was the same when I wanted a gigabit switch to add more ports in a room. Jaycar has a no-name off-brand model for $95.90. PB Tech had an equivalent known-brand (TP-Link) equivalent one for $44, and Noel Leeming has an equivalent (again, known brand) unit for $60.

With that sort of pricing, how are they managing to shift product?

neb

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#3205513 11-Mar-2024 22:29

Instead of soldering to the plugs, what about buying some pre-made cable with DIN connectors, chopping it off at an appropriate point, and then joining the wires with solder splice connectors and heatshrink over the top? I've done that before with hard-to-solder plugs/connectors, easier to join wires on existing cables than to solder new connectors onto them.

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sir1963

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#3205533 12-Mar-2024 07:00

neb: Instead of soldering to the plugs, what about buying some pre-made cable with DIN connectors, chopping it off at an appropriate point, and then joining the wires with solder splice connectors and heatshrink over the top? I've done that before with hard-to-solder plugs/connectors, easier to join wires on existing cables than to solder new connectors onto them.

Chemistry Lab. Once they are soldered you can then fill them full of silicon, makes them far more "spill proof".

There is method in my madness....

andrew75

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#3205536 12-Mar-2024 07:24

I got annoyed last time I visited wanting a magnetic reed switch to repair a chess clock. They had what I wanted but only in packs of 10. $4 each, wanted 1 (or would have brought 2 or 3) but they wanted me to buy the whole pack of 10. Stupid thing was they told me I could order a single one on line.

HelloThere

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#3209593 22-Mar-2024 14:13

Jaycar now have a new website currently under Beta testing

https://shop.jaycar.co.nz/

neb

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#3209984 23-Mar-2024 22:06

HelloThere: Jaycar now have a new website currently under Beta testing

https://shop.jaycar.co.nz/

That's part of their revamp to move everything online. Found out that the catalogue was a huge hassle for them, costing something like $500k to print and then distribute to hundreds of stores and resellers. It was out of date (mostly in terms of pricing) within a few months of being printed, but people would come in and demand to buy items at the price given in the catalogue rather than the current price.

The new web site is supposed to work as an improved version of the catalogue with things like infinite aisles where, if an item is out of stock, you can order it directly from the supplier, and improved search compared to the old site (although that particular bit wouldn't be hard).

k1w1k1d

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#3210012 24-Mar-2024 08:59

Search on the new site still has a few issues. Eufy RoboVac and a driveway beam are two of the six results when doing a search for "soundbar". Both sites give the same results, so doesn't look like much has changed?

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neb

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#3210295 24-Mar-2024 19:38

It's apparently still a work in progress, so expect changes as they update things.

Shinz

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#3215830 8-Apr-2024 18:22

We still seem to get Jaycars mailers pretty regularly & I still enjoy a riffle through them, as others have said, if they're local, they are pretty convenient & I can often sell more stuff to myself than what I went in for.

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