Building an Inverted Pendulum System The Ups and Downs of Defying Gravity…

Today was a bad day.  I decided to replace the cables on the encoders today.  Heated up the soldering iron and got to work.  Removed all the wires from the first encoder, then attached the new wires.  After reassembling everything, I noticed it was very difficult to turn the encoder during about half of each revolution.  Since it was the one I tested with the motor, I thought maybe I had bent the shaft due to a misalignment of the gears or something.  Resigned myself to the possibility of needing to purchase a replacement encoder.  Started on the second encoder a little later in the day.  Removed all the old wires, then noticed it was difficult to turn the shaft on this encoder also.  What I hadn’t realized on the first one was that the glass disk for encoder is directly underneath the circuit board.  When the solder was heated up and melted, it formed a large bead on the back of the circuit board which is now rubbing against the encoder disk.  Both encoders are ruined unless I can find a way to fix them.