Hey Road Testers!  What product(s) would you love to get your hands on?

An Arduino ZERO:

Arduino Blog » Blog Archive » Meet Arduino ZERO – the new board jointly developed by Arduino and Atmel

lslater doctorcdf - What do you guys think?  Arduino Zero, SMD Tools for an upcoming RoadTest?

the Zero would be great, I have a load of projects that ended up too much for the UNO or too slow even where it would fit so one of these would be great to compare to and extend on... Should be fun

not sure what SMD tools were thinking of, i've already played with a few SMD device (Like when I blew up my road test Battery Pack and had to repair it ... Ooops)

now testing out a re-flow oven in the mix would make it a winner

Peter

Maybe  E14 can do a kit of parts/tools/test board that demonstrate various components of soldering SMD

maybe with a few videos on E14. Basically a community supported kit

The Top members could put together a few tutorial videos to post in a common community area, great educational content and if it is using exclusively tools from E14, may even generate trade in the longer run

Exactly ...problem is that SMD tools can cover a big range of stuff, most of which not that interesting so if you want to give someone an SMD kit it needs to be co -ordinated around a deliverable ..like learn to SMD descretes, QFP, Highdensity devices in sort of sensible progression.

Then a micro-controller board KIT or something but also a couple of practice boards to learn

then once confidence and a few videos are done, build up your board and have a working practical end device...

Yeah a project with some LEDs, descretes a CPU and some comms ..some excuse to put components together then watch them flash almost usefully!

a basic smd kit should have at least the minimum.

anti-magnetic tweezers

optivisor

0.5mm or smaller diameter solder

liquid flux

flux cleaner and acid brush

blinnky 2.0

this could easily be built around an Arduino model or MSP43xx, that way the Energia or Arduino IDE and a programmer is easy to add

and the board could be repaired with easily sourced components

A few WS2812B LEDS, Temp sensor chip on I2C or SPI, easy add ons for an LCD and rotary switch and we have the basics of a home thermostat or something

Oh, Oh....please please... start this now and we could gear toward XMAS lighting system or something, put a theme around it, maybe less religious more fun but something... oh yes I see it formulating now ... where's the mask

blinnky 2.0

this could easily be built around an Arduino model or MSP43xx, that way the Energia or Arduino IDE and a programmer is easy to add

and the board could be repaired with easily sourced components

A few WS2812B LEDS, Temp sensor chip on I2C or SPI, easy add ons for an LCD and rotary switch and we have the basics of a home thermostat or something

Oh, Oh....please please... start this now and we could gear toward XMAS lighting system or something, put a theme around it, maybe less religious more fun but something... oh yes I see it formulating now ... where's the mask

Would love some kit to do LGA or other impossible SMD components...

You've got it ..Maybe a Bat Signal using RGB LEDs

Or a bat Stun light ..maybe inducing Vomiting or something nice like that

We need a dis like button/link

I've used Arduino Unos to control multiple strings of GE G35 Christmas lights and also WS2801's,

-Steve

The stunner is for use by bats not on bats so you are OK Peter...Maybe on a power ring like the "green lantern"