Care packages for the youth - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / beginners

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 01, 2015, 02:23:03 am
content: I have been collecting components for years,I have stuff I will never need (unless I give it away) I am willing to make up some care packages for the newbies.Shipping is a concern so my packages will be limited to the USA and Canada any one else in?I am talking about resistors, leds ,ic's,proto boards,caps,wire,solder and what have you.I think we should encourage the younger ones to experiment. all we need is a way to weed out the freeloaders.How about some feed back.bill

author: OC71
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 01, 2015, 06:42:53 am
content: Nice idea. Count me in.Reminds me how excited I was to get my first transistor (OC71)

author: TrunKate
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 01, 2015, 06:59:16 am
content: Well, I myself have a little newbie, his name is Thomas. Today we experimented with our Elenco 130 kit we just received! Kept him up till 11:30(bad mum, I know) and I myself am just now climbing into bed because I couldn't put the darned thing away! Just finished a Two transistor radio project and wanted to collapse. So worth it though! I think it is good to pass it on to children, especially ones who have less enthusiastic parents. I may derive as much or more satisfaction from this whole learning experience.

author: zerorisers
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 01, 2015, 12:32:37 pm
content: xrunner had a great idea with the contest. I think that can be used as a template. make sure people know to pay it forward and when they are able give back to the community. I got a fluke 27 on the way from extravoore from xrunners contest. It will be very helpful diagnosing this plasma screen I scored riding my bike up and down the alley ways of my neighborhood. It is a decent size and had to have my mother help me by bringing the car over. parts such as diodes, zener diodes, resistors and capacitors are probably all I'm going to have to work with for this project. going to see if there is any way I can actually test the caps on it. I know the big one works from the sparks it made when I shorted it out. Not sure how to test the little ones. Not sure of values and only wanna try to get what I would need. that way others can get what they need aswell.oh and TrunKate. before big trash pickup day you should ride down the alleys. people throw away old electronics there. I got a crockpot. sadly the porcelyn/ceramic whatever bowl inside broke cuz it fell of my bike but if i find another bowl i am difinately going to see about modifying it with an arduino if I can raise the money for one of them. Have one on hand but its for a company called drift america RC. mainly just helping trying to figure out how to program the damn thingbut thats a whole nother forum post in the microcontroller section. If you can use the lego mindstorm robots to teach your son basic programming. it will help quite a bit. and if he likes minecraft he can learn logic gates by playing with redstone. hope my info was helpful. going to school now. bye!

author: MoighonFweeman
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 02, 2015, 12:40:14 am
content: I personally think people should try to revive TGIMBOEJ. I just found out about it, and from what I hear the idea kind of failed after a while. Seems like a great idea to expose everyone, not just beginners, to interesting new components.

author: Lightages
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 02, 2015, 12:53:51 am
content: People can ask here:https://www.eevblog.com/forum/buysellwanted/the-parts-trading-thread-pay-it-forward!/I am sure if young beginners ask there they will find some people willing to send some things.

author: zerorisers
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 02, 2015, 01:24:30 am
content: after help from the forum I will be sure to pay it forward to new begginers. Or people who just need the equipment/ parts. It's a great community with great people. There should almost be a whole pay it forward section for room of multiple topics. Maybe even subcategories such as contests, giveaways, etc. Just ideas that are on top of my head. Can definstely be made more efficient but I think it's better than a single thread.

author: TrunKate
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 02, 2015, 02:48:20 am
content: Zerorisers, you always have great advice, you may be a beginner, but you have the right attitude and I have faith in your determination!

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 04, 2015, 04:29:42 am
content: I have made up some care packages but I have discovered I don't have many e caps.I included some voltage reg IC's and would to supply some caps to go with them,if you have some extra's 35v and above I would like to put them with in the packages.If you would like to be involved let me know.I have sent out two packages with some good thru hole components and circuit boards among other things.I would like to make up a few more. If you are in the us you can send a small priority mail box for $5.95.thanks in advancebill

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 04, 2015, 04:42:27 am
content: BTW I am not charging for shipping or anything.

author: MoighonFweeman
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2015, 02:09:39 am
content: Quote from: bills on April 04, 2015, 04:29:42 amI have a few more 470uF and 10uF electrolytics than I need. I've got about 8 470uF caps to spare, and maybe around 16 10uf caps. It might not be enough to be useful if you're including more than one cap of each value per package, but I can throw in a handful of other components to make it worth the postage. Although I don't exactly know the scale of this operation, so I have no clue how helpful I can be. If you're looking for a box of 200 capacitors, I most certainly can't help.Also, out of curiosity, I'd love to know what exactly is in these packages you're sending out.

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2015, 02:47:30 am
content: Quote from: MoighonFweeman on April 05, 2015, 02:09:39 am

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2015, 03:00:18 am
content: "Also, out of curiosity, I'd love to know what exactly is in these packages you're sending out."I try to tailor to the Interest of who I am sending it to.example, One I sent out had some LED's, op amps with sockets lm317 reg's with heat sinks, also a 7824 with heat sink,some diodes.a few low voltage caps ,1500' of 30ga magnet wire a proto board with some leads. a few meters of solder. some 22ga. wire, some dip circuit boards, ardunio uno , npn and pnp transistors. small n channel mosfets and of course a 555 timer with a socket.regardsbill

author: zerorisers
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2015, 03:42:19 am
content: Thanks to bill I have an arduono uno and other misc components ( as listed in his post above).He is very generous, and I will be sure to pay it forward when I am able. I have the Arduino IDE set up and ready to go. Tomorrow I will be attempting to create a thread of my experiences with the arduino. Code will be posted to github for others to learn from. pictures of schematics will be drawn up on a whiteboard for others to look at and see how it is set up. (Sorry if I get anything wrong on it), Pictures of the arduino set up will be posted, And I will make videos of the final product. I hope that others will be able to learn with me.again, thank you bill for the opportunity to learn, and for your generousity,-zerorisers

author: MoighonFweeman
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2015, 02:24:07 pm
content: Shucks, that's quite a nice beginner's kit. Could you tell me how to get the components to you? I'll throw in a few unwound ferrite toroids, a whole bunch of heatsinks, a few 9V snaps, some 16MHz crystals for standalone arduino work, and maybe some 555 timers if you need them (although you probably have tons of those, who doesnt?)Really just trying to unload some of my unneeded equipment to clean up my storage bins.I also still think we should try to revive something similar to the TGIMBOEJ, or maybe the Parts Trading Thread. I feel like both of those lost momentum.

author: brentab
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: April 05, 2015, 03:44:17 pm
content: I recently purchased U.S. $20,000 worth of merchandise (small electronic parts, resistors transistors, capacitors, LEDs, etc) from 2 Radio Shack stores before closing, for less than you can dream of.Let me Donate1. Proto boards2. Break out Boards3. Wire4. Project boxes5. Solder6. Battery holders7. Fuses8. Fuses holders9. Some LED10. Some Resistors11. Connectors12. Several other Misc. components

author: TrunKate
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2015, 05:55:48 pm
content: One project my son and I would like to have done by Halloween this year would be making a ghast costume. I am thinking it should have 2 phases. 1: friendly with their soft, gentle sounds and black eyes. 2: the eyes change shape & glow red, mouth also changes shapes and lights up red, the sounds are scary with explosions from fire balls.(hopefully you are familiar with this mob from Minecraft). An extra cool plus would be if I could get the tentacles to sway back to front like in the game with some motors.

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 06, 2015, 04:25:59 am
content: Quote from: brentab on April 05, 2015, 03:44:17 pmThat is very generous of you, I am going to a soon to be closing rs tomorrow and see what I can find.she who makes the rules ( wife ) is having trouble understanding what I am doing. (oh well)bill

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 06, 2015, 04:29:26 am
content: trun katepm me your address and what you need I will see what I can do.

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 06, 2015, 04:37:24 am
content: zerorisersCould use some caps. to go with the lm317 voltage reg. that I sent him and some leads for his proto board, battery holders would be handy and a transformer or 2 .

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 06, 2015, 04:41:46 am
content: I have not included any resistors,but any hacker can salvage these from used stuff.

author: MoighonFweeman
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 06, 2015, 11:09:25 pm
content: If you're sending out transformers with these kits, then the "beginners" these kits are targeted to include me as well. I have a pretty good amount of parts, but I haven't been able to get any transformers. If anyone could spare a transformer for me that would be the absolute best thing in the world!

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2015, 06:09:14 am
content: What kind of transformer do you need?I have quite a few but shipping would be the killer.bill

author: bills
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2015, 06:20:27 am
content: Have you tried looking at thrift stores?you can get plenty of transformers for next to nothing $0.50 way cheaper than shipping.lots of wall warts computer power supply's do some research.