As an aspiring electronics geek, I am still collecting cool tools and techniques for my projects. While working on a weekend project, I stumbled upon a treasure trove containing meticulous (almost obsessively complete) advice regarding soldering and circuit board design. These videos were the perfect addition to my education, and even though I already had halfway-decent soldering technique, I have definitely improved as a result of the videos. It even inspired me to get some new tools, like a needle-tipped soldering iron and desoldering wick.
So, unless you’ve been formally trained in an EE course, I really recommend the Tangent Tutorials series of videos. Excellent work, Tangent!
TT #1: Basic Soldering Equipment – My advice on the basic equipment necessary for DIY electronics work. 27 minutes.
TT #2: Basic Soldering Techniques – How to solder thru-hole components, plus basic advice for all sorts of soldering. 9 minutes.
TT #3: Surface Mount Soldering Techniques – How to solder surface-mount components using only basic DIYer equipment. Covers SO-8 chips and 2-lead parts in 1206 and larger size packages. 14 minutes.
With just two parts your Arduino goes portable, powered by a 9V battery. Note that these connections are the same ones you’d use to make a plug to connect to a solar cell array, a car lighter plug or a larger battery.
You’ll need a 9V battery clip, a 2.5mm power plug, a soldering iron and some solder, and optionally a small piece of heat shrink tubing.
Okay – I’m going to stop raving about the Arduino eventually, but right now I wanted to share a picture of my 9v batter adapter. If you’ve been following the exploits of my infrared receiver, then you have watched the project increase in complexity. The software is totally cool, the breadboard has been exchanged with a protoshield, and now I have gotten rid of wired power (no USB cable, no 9v AC/DC adapter).
That’s right – this little computer is totally portable now! w00t! It behaves just like it does when it’s plugged in.
This gives me an idea: now that I can carry this thing with me, what about an arduino tv-b-gone? hmmmmm… I’ve found this code, but it’s pretty ugly… Maybe that would be worthy follow-up project for my IR decoder.
David Anderson: Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!After struggling for days to get OpenOffice to download and work on my Mac Mini, only to find that the official version only works on the Intel model...
Chile: Thanks for your advice Andre. I followed what you suggested and it appears that you were right. Since the IR sensor is deep purple itself I thought the IR filter was present already but no....
Murano Glass: My main browser is Firefox because I like the feature that they offer remembering the username and passwords that you have registered or key in the browser. The second best browser...
I’ve