Have any helpful maker tips? Send them my way!

Hello RoadTest!

I'm working with our community team on a second volume of our Essential Tips for Makers eBook series (you can see the original here). Our fearless RoadTest leader rscasny suggested that I reach out to our wonderful group here and see if anyone might have some useful tips they've picked up that they'd be willing to contribute.

We'll be printing this eBook for distribution at Electronica 2018, and of course it'll live on in perpetuity on the community as well. If you have any ideas you'd like to share, please leave them in this thread! Also feel free to reach out to me directly if you have any questions.

Thanks everyone!

Top Replies

dougw over 7 years ago

Sticky Third Hand
Use Kapton tape to pick up components and hold them in place while they get soldered. This avoids components skittering out of position as soon as the iron or the solder touch them. It also avoids small components popping out of your tweezers and disappearing forever. It also works for holding wires in position during soldering.
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gpolder over 7 years ago in reply to littleben1

fully agree, and connected to that, if you are far from a water tap, keep a small bottle with water close by, for watering the sponge.
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gpolder over 7 years ago

Prototyping:

For prototypes, copper-coated laminate board (base material of PCBs) is indispensable. You can easily solder parts or other plates, it is easy to drill or saw, you can make housings, even front plates. Moreover, it gives a good ground plane and or shielding for RF experiments.
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gpolder over 7 years ago in reply to gpolder

Regarding the copper clad front plates mentioned above, They don't look nice, therefore I make a drawing of the front-plate, and let it print on vinyl stickers which I glue over the copper clad.
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gpolder over 7 years ago

Connections:

For making temporary connections WAGO clamps (Product LinkProduct Link) are indispensable:
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gpolder over 7 years ago

PCB making:

If your circuit has identical sections, it's much cheaper to make small PCB's of these sections in stead of putting it all on one PCB.
An example of three I/O extenders spread over three small boards can be found in my up cycled Nixie display project. ([Upcycle It] Nixie Display #7 - Interface PCBs )
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mcb1 over 7 years ago in reply to gpolder

At work we use one of those one time use water bottles....(you know the ones that people buy from a shop because they don't think our beautiful tap water is worth drinking.)

However wet sponges is a good way to destroy tips, and I have changed to the brass type dish scrubbers from your local supermarket or other retailer.
They are a dollar or so each and IMO do just as good a job.

Mark
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luislabmo over 7 years ago in reply to dougw

Nice tip Doug!. Another one is to add heat-shrink tubing to third hands, this improves their grip and reduces the chances of getting permanent marks on some objects, like when grabbing wire.

Luis
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geralds over 7 years ago

Hi Daniel,

for example describing how you can create an adapter.
Some more tips from the road testers as well tips shopping the parts can be found here:
FPC1500 Spectrum Analyzer

Best Regards
Gerald
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Attachments:
Create Your Own Adapter.pdf
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dougw over 7 years ago in reply to luislabmo

luislabmo I like that twisted pin trick - a new one for me...
(I tend to use vise grip pliers to squeeze the pins until they fit)
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