Terminal Strips: Thumbs Up Or Down?

[BillEpstein]

My original SSE build was without them figuring eliminating a connector was a good thing. I also didn't quite trust the little screw-downs.

Now that I have removed the wires from the board for the move to the new chassis and ruined more than one eyelet, I'm re-thinking. I like to tinker.

It's also a PITA to get tinned 18ga. into the smallish eyelets.

Opinions?

 

[Steven-H]

Bill -
One option (that I did) was to install turrets into the board. That way I can solder/desolder to the turret instead of the board.

 

[JonSnell Electronic]

All older and reliable amplifiers were built with paxolin strip terminal strips. Dead easy to replace components and no through hole pcboard to worry about. Yes most definitely a yes!

 

[YashN]

The terminals make it all a bit too fiddly for me: while the principle is very good (you can easily reconfigure the amp), the time taken just to get two wires to stay put in the terminal holes while I screw them in tight is just too much. And it doesn't really work well, until the terminal casing itself gives way...

The holes should be wider.

The turrets seems a good idea.

 

[Andersonix]

These Euro style terminal blocks are idiot proof:
http://apexjr.com/images/EUROTERMINALBLOCK1.jpg

 

[denny3249]

I use the bakelite terminal strips with soldering lugs in almost all my builds and rebuilds.... they come in many configurations...with or w/o ground lugs. Just bend the wire or wires, solder...

 

[Tubelab_com]

The original TSE board does not use the terminal strips. Many a board has been ruined by a user soldering or unsoldering a transformer wire. Response to the terminal strips has been favorable and I use them in all my projects to make things easier to build and take apart.

There have been no issues, with one exception. I would not use them in the final build of a guitar amp that will spend most of its life sitting on top of the speaker cabinet, especially if it is a bass guitar amp. The constant vibration will cause the screws to loosen over the years.