Absolutely no soldering required! All that's needed is a few gentle taps with a hammer and bazinga! Your header is securely attached to your Pi Zero or pHAT. If your soldering isn't quite up to scratch, or you just don't own a soldering iron yet, then these nifty hammer headers ...Absolutely no soldering required! All that's needed is a few gentle taps with a hammer and bazinga! Your header is securely attached to your Pi Zero or pHAT. If your soldering isn't quite up to scratch, or you just don't own a soldering iron yet, then these nifty hammer headers might be just the job.
They come in male and female flavours, and use crafty little retaining nubbins to grip tightly into the holes on the PCB. The installation jig kit contains two acrylic base pieces, onto which your Pi Zero or pHAT sits, two nylon bolts, an acrylic top piece onto which you hammer, and both a male and female header. Make sure you carefully read the guide for fitting hammer headers.
If you want to try without it then godspeed to you but it is a delicate and tricky process! The female headers are simpler to insert than the male headers as you can hammer straight onto the plastic of the header, but the male ones are particularly tricky without the jig. If you follow our guide carefully then you should be fine. Watch the Pimoroni demo of how to fit the hammer headers on Bilge Tank, below.