Comments on: Setting up a Home Electronics Workshop – Tools

By: rapatap

rapatap — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 23:28:32 +0000

A great place for tools at basement bargain prices is HarborFreight. Found a small vice, caliper, precision screwdriver, etc. – all for less than $10 each. They have coupons/discounts on different stuff all the time.

By: aonomus

aonomus — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 16:50:37 +0000

Jameco or Futurlec seem to have some good component assortments.

Another thing not mentioned in the article is a ’3rd hand’. The standard cheap 3rd hand tools are just a pair of alligator clips that break fairly easily and end up scratching your PCB if you position it incorrectly.

A much better tool is a dedicated PCB holder, for example the Panavise Jr (which I’ve been trying to track down a local source for ages and haven’t found one yet…).

As for the solder fume extractor, anyone needing to do it on the cheap should check Instructables since its somewhat easy to do this without needing many parts.

By: Phill

Phill — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:09:00 +0000

I got a few grab bags of components from jameco, and they seemed to be a good deal. They also have a full kits that give you a few of each part.

By: Berni

Berni — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 17:50:58 +0000

A lab powersupply is also a nice thing to have.I ben wanting to make one for years but i never got to it. Also whats useful is those big boxes of small drawers or seperatable plastic boxes to keep components organized.

The piece of equipment i want a lot is a oscilloscope, but they are big clunky and expensive.I set out to build a digital one my self.Im aiming for a 100Mhz sample rate and some extra functions like a logic analiser and a simple frequency generator.And stick it in a small,portable battery powered box.

By: Jack

Jack — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 09:29:27 +0000

If you want to find the best deal, I recommend you google for something along the lines of “resistor kit”.

One company that offers pretty good kits is Electronix Express. If you go to their Components page (http://www.elexp.com/cmp-indx.htm), select a component, and you’ll see a list of offerings for that component, including kits.

By: Igor Yermak

Igor Yermak — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:36:07 +0000

I’m interested in buying a variety pack of sorts with a bunch of different capicitators,resistors and leds.

I don’t have any electronic parts besides the ones I manage to desolder.

By: Eric

Eric — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 06:06:56 +0000

Hah! I have that same aforementioned twitch!

Mine is basically limited to my left eye, and my right trigger finger. Real weird.