Where To Start In DIY Electronics?

pyrosine writes "I've been thinking about this for a while and have no idea where to start. I have little or no previous experience in electronics — just what is covered in GCSE physics (wiring a plug and resistors — not much, I know). The majority of my interest lies in the wireless communication side of the field — i.e. ham radios and CB — but I am also interested in how many things work, one example being speakers, simply to better understand it. I would preferably like to start with some form of practical guide rather than learning the theory first, but where I would find such a walkthrough eludes me."

Comments

Forrest Mims

[seanadams.com]

Gettng Started in Electronics . It takes you through everything from basic soldering to building logic circuits, oscillators, amplifiers. His "mini notebooks" are great too.

Once you have the basics down you will probably want to get into microcontrollers. There are a lot of ways to go here depending on how much time you want to spend wiring things up yourself, and your comfort level with software. You might start with the very popular PIC. Although the architecture is a bit long in the tooth and is a poor target for C, there loads of example projects for it so it's easy to learn. There are also many high-level building blocks (Basic stamp etc) that can get you up and running quickly. If you have sophisticated software needs, you'll want a more modern micro with better tools - check out Atmel or TI.

Eventually you will need a more formal treatment if you want to design your own circuits. I consider The Art of Electronics to be the bible here - it is thorough but also very practical and you will find it has specific solutions for many everyday engineering problems. It has been a great investment, and one of the better worn books on my shelf. Have fun!

Re:Forrest Mims

[Anonymous Coward]

Art of Electronics is a good book. I am an EE and I have it and would replace it if stolen.

I probably wouldn't replace the other one if I owned it and it was stolen.

Re:Forrest Mims

[Curtman]

You might start with the very popular PIC. Although the architecture is a bit long in the tooth and is a poor target for C, there loads of example projects for it so it's easy to learn. There are also many high-level building blocks (Basic stamp etc) that can get you up and running quickly.

I would highly recommend the Arduino to beginners. It's a great target for C, and there's loads of example projects for it too. Seeed Studio has been a great resource for me, especially the store, and the forum. #arduino on Freenode is popular and very helpful too.

Re:Forrest Mims

[serviscope_minor]

I can second almost everything that you say.

1. Forest M. Mimms III books are fantastic.

2. The PicStart1 kit is very good, with excellent Linux support. The PIC datasheets are very thorough and contain all the information you need. This makes using PICs really rather covenient.

3. The art of electronics is a truly excellent book. Amusingly, in the first edition, it points to the now venerable 741 op-amp as being obsolete. It is still going strong to this day.

4. Designing your own analogue circuits is hard. Designing your own RF circuits is very hard. It is about 70% theory and 65% black magic, along with about 10% blind luck. However you can start from existing designs. Build them to get practise then start modifying them.

5. Transmission line transformers are deeply strange.

Based on the OP's use of the term "GCSE", I assume that he is English. So: Find your local Maplin. They are very handy, since you can often pick up parts from the store, reducing the latency for project building if you forget to buy the right parts. Farnell and RS are handy places to mail-order from.

I also recommend getting a solderless breadboard, a DC power supply (a cheap wall-wart will do, as will 6V lantern batteries), a small tube of 741s and 555s, 100 resistor reels of: 100R, 1K, 10K, 100K and 1M resistors, a big bag of misc. caps, a reel of red and a reel of black single core wire, a multimeter, a bag of LEDs and a bag of small-signal transistors (eg 2N2222). That will do you for many of the things in (1) above.

Re:Forrest Mims

[falconwolf]

Gettng Started in Electronics

If you're going with Forrest Mims, go all the way and get his Electronics Learning Lab. From there check out MakerShed's Intro Electronics. Also check out, and subscribe to, Make Zine. You mention micro-controllers, they have a number of projects that will let you learn them. One I liked and thought about trying was Garduino: Gardening + Arduino. This project uses an Arduino controller to control how much light and water plants get.

Now the OP asked about ham radio and CB, the best thing there is to find a local amateur radio group and ask them about learning. I don't know if things have changed much, but the local groups I knew or heard of were willing to help new people. They even had free classes.

Falcon

Simple answer

[Gordonjcp]

The majority of my interest lies in the wireless communication side of the field -- i.e. ham radios and CB

Join your local amateur radio club. Get your licence.

73s de MM0YEQ

There Are No Electrons: Electronics for Earthlings

[jab]

Thumbs up from this electrical engineer. Here's a portion of the Amazon description:

It may be the only "introduction to electronics books" with back cover comments by Dave Barry, Ray Bradbury, Clive Cussler, and George Garrett, as well as recomendations from Robert Hazen, Bob Mostafapour, Dr. Roger Young, Dr. Wayne Green, Scott Rundle, Brian Battles, Michelle Guido, Herb Reichert and Emil Venere. As Monitoring Times said, "Perhaps the best electronics book ever. If you'd like to learn about basic electronics but haven't been able to pull it off, get There Are No Electrons. Just trust us. Get the book."

Very important first step

[idontgno]

Learn not to grab hot soldering iron by the barrel or tip.

Handle is much safer.

Metalesson 1: it doesn't matter if you think you need to keep your eyes on that twitchy almost-mechanically-sound connection in order to keep it from springing apart before you can solder it. You still need to pick your head up and guide your hands to the soldering iron, because grasping blindly WILL HURT.

Re:Very important first step

[Maddog Batty]

This is not a joke. It is insightful advise and it doesn't matter how many times you are told before you start, you will still learn this lesson the hard way.

There is a reason soldering iron handles are bright yellow. It will still not stop you from picking it up by the hot bit at least once...

Re:Very important first step

[c 0xFF]

Lesson 2: Don't let out the magic smoke.

While the general population may be unaware, electronics gurus know that all components rely on a small amount of magic smoke. Manufacturers want you to think that some sort of fancy semiconductor physics is responsible for the operation of their device. This is a lie.

If the smoke escapes, the device will no longer work. It is vital to the operation of the chip; do not let it out.

Short list

[Paul Rose]

Short list:
1) Horowitz and Hill "Art of Electronics" 2nd ed -- human readable mix of theory and practical application -- must have
2) ARRL Handbook -- any year in the past decade -- great introduction to RF communications, good mix of theory and practice -- must have for ham radio
3) Wes Hayward "Experimental Methods in RF design" -- must have for homebrew ham radio enthusiast who wants practical advice but also wants to learn the theory

Re:Do what I did

[blair1q]

Wikipedia is your friend

You mean the flaky one with the congenital deformities, who sometimes has answers you don't have yourself, who comes up with random shit out of the blue that you can only trust about 70% of, who always seems to be in legal trouble over stuff you learned not to do in kindergarten, and who hits you up for money every time you see him?

Re:The Art of Electronics

[richardkelleher]

I concur on The Art of Electronics. It contains most of the information I received in two+ years of Electrical Engineering classes. It starts out slow with the basics, this is a resistor, this is a capacitor, this is an inductor and the like. Scanning through my (now 21 year old) second edition, about the only area it doesn't cover that I got in school is power, but then power is not electronics.

If you are not interested in getting an engineering degree to do some DIY electronics, I'd suggest two places to start: 1. Make: magazine. Regular articles on electronic control circuits with some good information on how they work. (and many other great things I might add) 2. The Encyclopedia of Electronic Circuits, Rudolf F. Graf. (now called Volume 1, since they put out 6 more over the years) It has almost 100 simple to complex circuits with descriptions of what they do, but not much about how. To get the how, get The Art of Electronics and plan on reading a lot of the first 100 pages and then using it for a reference each time you try to decipher what some circuit is doing.

Online circuit tutorial

[LostInTransportation]

Try: http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/ This has some good lessons describing the prinicples behind circuitry, and suggests some experiments to try. Best of all, it's free!

get some old junk radios

[mirix]

Something from the 70's - 80's. shouldn't be more than a couple bucks a piece at garage sales. Old enough to be discrete components, as opposed to a radio-on-chip sort of deal. Get an ARRL handbook from the 70's. Get a soldering iron.

If you still can't get your head around something, try asking for help at dutchforce electronics forums

You have to stick to it, and sooner or later it all makes sense. :-)

If you have a local amateur radio club, they might be helpful. (they might just be a bunch of grumpy old men too, it depends on the chapter...)

Be prepared to be shocked

[TimothyDavis]

I have had plenty of times shocking myself when playing with what I thought were safe devices. Here are a couple that caught me off guard:

1: Capacitors. Even though you are unplugged and powered off, a capacitor can be holding a surprise for you. The one that I learned on was built into a camera flash: So even though the device was powered by a couple of AA batteries (removed), sitting in wait was a capacitor with several thousand volts. I recall getting up off the floor wondering WTF just happened.

2: Relays. These devices use an electromagnet to move a metal reed, which closes (or opens) the connection for another circuit. Be aware that when a magnetic field collapses, electricty is 'made'. So even though I was driving the electromagnet with 9v, the shock I got when the field collapsed was likely several hundred volts. This wouldn't have been quite the problem, if I weren't using the relay to drive the relay (the switched circuit was closed in the unpowered position, and open when powered) - which creates an oscillator. This means that I shocked myself quite a few times before I could get the breadboard off of my hand.

Get yourself a Heathkit...

[arfonrg]

..oh, wait...

Get yourself an Allied Radio kit... oh wait...

Get your self a copy of Popular Electronics... oh wait...

Get yourself a copy of Electronic Hobbyist... oh wait...

Forget it, just go buy a new chinese made mp3 player!