Question about using thermal paste on connector pins in high-vibration bays

I had a chat with an old F-16 tech last week who said he puts a tiny dab of thermal paste on connector pins in high-vibration bays to help with heat transfer and prevent fretting corrosion. He said he's been doing it for like 15 years on his personal projects and never had a pin fail. I mean, it kind of makes sense since the paste fills micro-gaps, but idk if it would cause issues with signal interference or if it attracts dirt over time. Has anyone else tried this trick, or should I just stick with the standard dielectric grease for my bench tests?

3 comments

3 Comments

henry_martinez16d ago

Honestly that's a wild trick but after thinking about it, the thermal paste filling micro-gaps part makes a lot of sense for vibration resistance. Ngl I used to think thermal paste anywhere near pins was asking for shorts, but this guy's 15 years of personal projects says a lot. Tbh I'd probably give it a try on a bench test first just to see how it holds up over a few months before committing to it. The dirt attraction thing is a real concern though, so maybe stick to a really thin layer and see if it stays put.

xena37316d ago

Wait, hold up. "15 years of personal projects" - that part just hit me. I re-read it like three times because I thought maybe I was imagining it. That's not just a weekend warrior tinkering with a single build, that's basically a whole career's worth of trial and error on different hardware. Honestly, the fact that he's been doing this for a decade and a half and hasn't reported a single short or fried board is what finally cracked my skepticism. My own track record with thermal paste near pins is maybe two or three close calls over ten years, and even then I was sweating bullets each time. But with that kind of history, the vibration resistance argument starts to sound less like a hack and more like a legit technique for specific setups.

thomas.tyler16d ago

I remember reading somewhere that non-conductive pastes are basically harmless near pins, which checks out here.