"isw" wrote in message
]...
I have a piece of gear that uses a "cable" consisting of printed circuit
traces laminated between two pieces of dark orange plastic (Kynar???).
The cable was torn in two, and I need to repair it. If I could remove
about an eighth of an inch of the insulation on one side of each end, I
could lap them and solder the conductors. The plastic it totally
resistant to every solvent I have on hand, and a 750F soldering iron has
no effect.

Does anybody know of a solvent for the plastic, or some other way to
strip the traces?

Isaac

The plastic can often be 'stripped' with a blunt(ish) curve-bladed scalpel,
scraped across the surface, with it on a flat hard surface such as an old
ceramic tile. Having said that, I have found that the orange ones such as
you used to find in Panasonic answer machines and on Pioneer lasers, are
much more resistant to any kind of stripping, than the white ones. You might
also try ally oxide paper such as you might use for flatting a paint surface
on a car body.

If you manage to get a connection that works ok, I would suggest that it is
then covered with something like a bead of silicone rubber (not the bathroom
sealer type which releases acetic acid as it cures) to help relieve any
stress on the joints, if it is in an application where it flexes in normal
use. If it is not, and you can't get a good connection, you could consider
just hard wiring between the two boards that it connects. If it is socketed
at both ends, replacement flexiprints in many different pitch, ways and
length configurations, are available.

For instance

http://search.digikey.com/scripts/Dk...6&keywords=FPC

Arfa