Rock-bottom Dollar SOIC Programming Socket

While I was working on my Furry Friends project for Halloween I had the need to program 12 Atmel ATTiny45 chips before I soldered them up. I could have programmed them in-circuit but then I thought of this.

This board was originally for code development. Once the development was done I desoldered the chip and put epoxy around the wires to make it robust.
Originally I was holding the chip onto the board while hitting return on my ‘make upload’ command but that was pretty hit-and-miss.
Enter Sugru.
I drilled a couple of registration holds on either side of the SOIC pads on the board. Then I glued a chip to the board with carpenters glue and put a dollop of Sugru on top of it and let it set.

Then I pulled out the chip and trimmed it up a bit.


To program the chip I gently clamped the sugru to the board and programmed. Viola! I programmed the 12 chips without a hitch and saved a couple of hunded dollars on a SOIC programming socket.

Sugru!

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