What would you put in a solder aid or emergency maker kit?

I don't hot glue enough for a glue gun to make it into the emergency kit, but I can see others justifying having it in their kit. Most of the time I heat up the end of a glue stick with hot air or a lighter than put a big gob to hold something down. When I hot glued a thermistor to a solar panel I used a magnifying glass to heat up the hot glue, no batteries required! 

I don't hot glue enough for a glue gun to make it into the emergency kit, but I can see others justifying having it in their kit. Most of the time I heat up the end of a glue stick with hot air or a lighter than put a big gob to hold something down. When I hot glued a thermistor to a solar panel I used a magnifying glass to heat up the hot glue, no batteries required! 

Same here, I have a hot glue gun and it's been used zero times so far, I'm just not experienced enough with that glue to know the situations to use the tool, since there are usually other adhesives around.

Regarding hot air tool, I do a similar thing with Polydoh (it's supposed to be softened in boiling water, but hot air tool works better for small quantities of the pellets.

I recently used hot glue to fashion a strain relief (along with heatshrink) when connecting wire to a Kelvin clip - the wire needed to be immobilized to prevent stress on the solder joint:

Sometimes it is hard to beat the hot glue solution.

How would you tackle this build?

I would hot glue more if I were better at it.  It could be that I need a better tool as I always have problems with dripping, but it's probably just me.  I guess I'm impatient too because it takes a while for the glue to set up (it could be that I get it too hot).

Maybe I'll get a USB gun and see if I can do better.  If I could apply the hot glue with some precision, I think that I'd use it with some of my 3D prints, but I doubt if I would ever get that to work.

My wife uses it successfully for crafting, so it's probably just a skill issue.

dougw said:

How would you tackle this build?

• sleeved grommets in the end of the clip handles
• test lead sockets in the end of the clip handles
• cable tie through the plastic, around the cable, and back through the plastic

Perhaps a little less glue

I've got test leads that have similar clips, they implemented the wiring slightly differently, coming out one end of each clip (i.e. looping one wire in a U-shape to reach the other side from inside).

Photo on my fancy mouse pad : 

I don't think they did anything apart from soldering them and then a bit of heatshrink, but I've not cut them apart to see what they did, because I use these clips. I think they just expect it to last a while, long enough for the wear-and-tear to not be significant perhaps.

Here's a photo of the inside of an unused one (same type) (to anyone who is not familiar with these, the copper part is the terminal with some solder already on it, and the other metal piece is just part of the spring that holds the clips closed).

I don't know if it would work, but maybe pack the cable with a bit of sleeving, and then as Dave says use a cable tie (could make a couple of notches on the inside for that). The head of a small cable tie could then be on the inside, and it wouldn't interfere with the other side, because the two cables would egress from the one side. This cunning plan may or may not work : ) 

Ah, now we get the full picture.. Looks like Doug's been busy with the cutting tools 

I think you could 3D print a form that would nicely match the profile of the end of that handle and then transition it into a round cable exit sleeve (using a tapered extrude from a square profile to a round profile).

You could then either lightly glue the mating faces of the 3D printed form onto the end of the clip handle or use glue-lined heatshrink (or both for 'belt and braces') then use smaller diameter heatshrink onto the exiting cable to hold it and form a strain relief onto the test lead.   

You could go one step further and 3D print a form for inside the clip handle and have a hollow spigot pass through the U-shaped opening to connect the internal and external 3D printed parts together, sandwiching the clip handle between in the process.

I love glue-lined heat-shrink : ) It's a brilliant problem-solver. 3D printing would be a nice solution.

Incidentally these sorts of Kelvin clips are really nice. I have slightly more expensive ones, but these ones are a better size, and have a good feel to them, just the right amount of springiness : ) 

A quick solution might be to drill through the plastic clip handle from the outside and through the copper inside. Insert the stripped cable from the outside through the hole and solder to the copper on the inside. Fold the insulated cable against the outside of the clip handle then slip some glue-lined heat-shrink over the cable and clip handle and heat to secure it in place.