Electronics - Stage one soldered

I figure it's time to take a photo and post it if it looks slightly different to how it did before.

It doesn't actually work, but you don't know that, so you may maintain a suitable expression of impressed-ness, and congratulation.

It still needs the adjustment equipment, and then needs to be cut so it isn't so long. The plan is to fit it into the PVC tube it's sitting in, but I want to wait until everything is on the board before I trim it to size. I could probably cut it now, because I have left all that space at the top right for all the adjustable things.

Adjustments to things like numbers of feeds per day will be made with "Pots" or potentiometers. A potentiometer is a thing like a volume knob except mine will be adjusted using a screwdriver so you cant accidentally change them. 

Currently, my board looks like this.

I doesn't look like much, but it's still challenging me.

It's a dot to dot.

I made it work on the breadboard.

There are the same number of holes on the stripboard.

Just copy it over.


Except I thought I should change a few things.

Oh well.

Because this is my first project, what I should have done is made a replica of the breadboard by cutting tracks to the same layout. It would have wasted a few holes in the stripboard, but I wouldn't have had to change anything.

The other side looks like this.

Soldering on stripboard is a totally different beast as compared to a circuit board, or even the board with just coppered holes on it.

Because the strips are long and large, they act as a heat sink and suck all the temperature out of your soldering iron.

The solder also flows along the length of the strips rather than forming a nice dot around the pin you are working on.

No doubt I'll get better with practice.

Or not, who knows.


120 things in 20 years - not quite Electronics - Stage one soldered

Electronics - Soldering

Soldering irons are hot.

I know because I just touched one.

This was going to be an excited description of my new electronics stuff I bought, but typing with one hand in a glass of water slows you down somewhat, so this might be a brief post.

See.

Electronics - Soldering helper

Just as people named Bill turn out to be excellent at welding, it turns out people named Pete turn out to be excellent at helping you with soldering.

I recommend finding someone named Pete to help you with soldering if you can. If you do go looking for a Pete, try to get one that makes you one of these.

It's a clamp.

But not just any clamp.

It's a clamp for holding circuit boards.

You clamp in your board...

place your components in...

bend the legs a little to hold them in place...

Then flip the board over to solder them in place.

The most amazingly useful bit of ongoing help anyone could provide.

Thanks people named Pete, wherever you are.

Electronics - Soldering and sweet and sour mandarin marmalade

Huge day at the office today.

I learnt some stuff.

And got some stuff.

But mostly, I can make a LED flash.

And I can solder well enough to keep it flashing.

From where I stand that's pretty exciting, but I do understand if you're not quite as excited as I am.

One or two of these joints look pretty good.

Some look like they need a quick trip to the dentist.

But they all work. In fact they work so well, A program has been uploaded and actually works.



I also made some really nice sweet and sour sauce.

I added rice wine vinegar and a pinch of salt to my mandarin marmalade.

Versatile stuff that mandarin marmalade.

And tasty.