inspiration for newbies

[Rodgre]

After almost twenty years of stompbox DIY-ing, I've suddenly decided to start a new habit....

I've had an "exerimenter's breadboard" from Radio Shack for probably fifteen years or so, and I've used it occasionally, but I more often than not, opted to try new projects by soldering onto perfboard. When a schematic was incorrect or if I wired something wrong, it was SO frustrating and such a pain in the neck to take the parts off the boards to salvage them.

Last night, I decided to try out a project on the breadboard just to see if it would sound useful to me before I built it "for real." I forgot how quick and easy it was to work that way.

The project worked immediately, and I realized it wasn't for me, so I pulled the parts, put them back in my bins and tried another project. Since then, I've breadboarded a bunch of other projects. Since last night, I've done the Uglyface, the Shin-Ei FY-2, A Harmonic Jerkulator and a Kay tremolo. All worked, and all were breadboarded well within an hour.

Maybe everyone out there is testing circuits on breadboards first, and I'm just coming around, but I started from square one back in the mid-80's by reading Electronic Projects for musicians and etching PC boards from the beginning, later switching to perfboard.

I suggest anyone just starting out gets a breadboard like this:

or this:


It will help you troubleshoot when projects don't work, and it will give you quicker satisfaction when it does work.

Again, a lot of you are rolling your eyes at me and saying "duh, welcome to the future" but if someone had given me this advice fifteen years ago, I'd probably have a lot less dead boards sitting in a box right now....

Roger

[toneless]

Hi!Do you know how these thing works?
I think i need one of these...

Nick Prionas

[Rodgre]

Well the board is set up like a grid. Each row is connected, so if you put components in the same row in the grid, they connect.

You pop in a resistor across a couple of rows, and then pop a cap (pardon the pun) in one end, a wire to your input jack to the other.... Once you look at one of these boards, it all becomes self-explanatory. You should also get yourself a little kit of solid-core wire to connect things too. RS sells such a kit as well.

Roger

[marc]

Wasn't there a discussion here a while ago pointing out properties of breadboard that might affect audio type circuits? I recall something about the inherent capacitance of the breadboard substrate that might alter or discolour some circuits. Just wondering...
marc.

[Rodgre]

Marc, I missed that thread, but you may be right. Still, to a newbie, or someone looking to quickly throw a simple circuit together to see if it works, the tradeoff is worth it.

Roger

[Andy]

I can't seem to grasp the concept of the breadboard.  I understand how it's laid out but I guess my real problem is not being able to read schematics very well.  Hopefully, as time rolls on, I will get it.

[Gilles C]

This could be a good site to check.

Look at the breadboard section.

http://www.geocities.com/gactnet/electro/bet.html

Gilles

[Tim Escobedo]

If it wasn't for the solderless breadboard, I'd probably never get anything designed.

There can be issues with these things acting up, particularly with the high impedances typically involved in electric guitars. Crosstalk, stray capacitances, and such. But for the most part, I rarely find it to be a problem.  It would be a bigger issue with RF and other high frequency stuff.

[The Tone God]

All I can say is that the breadboard is one of the most useful pieces of equipment. I have half a dozen or so of various sizes ranging from the above size to boards about four times that size. I can test ideas out and do initial tweaking before designing a PCB. It would be hard to live without one in my opinion.

Get one, or two, or more, NOW!!!

Andrew

[moosapotamus]

Breadboards rock!

I've always got something stuck in mine. It's the easiest way in the world to plug a bunch of components together to make a circuit (once you've managed to wrap your head around the concept).

I'll also use my breadboard to check out a PCB after I get it populated, before wiring it into an enclosure. Everything just hangs out, making it really easy to debug it, try different value pots, input/output caps, different mods, and whatever...

Here's a picture of two boards connected together through my breadboard. All the necessary jacks, pots, etc. are also plugged into the breadboard so I can take it for a test drive.



~ Charlie

[Peter Snowberg]

I'll fourth that!

Three cheers to whoever came up with them!

Just remeber to keep lead lengths short, and to use a good ground technique and you can get away with a lot of circuits no problem. Most people get into problems with circuits that look like rats nests. I know I always do.... Keep your layouts concise and clean and they will respect you back.

Use good capacitors for power supply bypassing (and enough of them too!) and use the thickest wire the board will allow without damage for wiring power and ground together. I've had power problems using smaller than max size wire.

I like to have a set of pots (audio and log) with 1 inch leads on them for breadboarding. Same goes for a handfull of small switches. It makes it really easy to try new values.

-Peter