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Foxfire_ posted:Board stackup, decoupling capacitors, and ground plane cuts are all related topics. This is an awesome post... thanks. Here's a good video that explains them as well. If people aren't aware of this guy, he has some amazing learning electronics videos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EaTdc2mr34
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Oct 2, 2022 04:40
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Shame Boy posted:Neat! And thinking about it, if it's just going to wave the things back and forth, even if the servos make the arduino glitch it will probably just cause it to reboot and it will just immediately start waving back and forth again. Thanks, good tip on the hot glue. I was trying to think of some way to make it more secure. And for the splicing, I've done my fair share of car radios and had to do similar, just use an xacto to cut a strip of insulation away, wrap them together and solder. Was rather proud how well that part came out.
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Oct 2, 2022 09:33
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Howdy, folks. So I am trying to get into animatronics - mostly modding existing things, etc. Nearly all the links in the First Post are dead. Even a linked youtube video now requires payment to watch? So - assume I don't know a capacitor from a diode from a potentiometer I mean - I DO, but assume I don't. Where's a good place to start learning the basics of simple circuits?
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Oct 3, 2022 14:42
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HaB posted:Howdy, folks. I think it kinda depends on what kind of learner you are. Personally I always found playing around with simulators to be the easiest way for me to figure this out, so if I were getting started again I'd either use Falstad or iCircuit, which is apparently available for windows now in addition to mac so that's neat. You have to buy it but it's only a few bucks, it's basically just the Falstad engine with a much nicer UI. iCircuit at least also comes with a bunch of example circuits so you can start with those and play around. If you want a comprehensive, up-to-date textbook that covers... basically everything, The Art of Electronics 3rd Edition is the go-to choice of basically everyone. And hey guess what, it's on archive.org for free! https://ia803204.us.archive.org/6/items/art-of-electronics-3e/Art%20of%20Electronics%203e.pdf. I paid like $150 for my physical copy of it when it first came out, don't I feel silly! Though honestly nothing really beats just getting some stuff and playing around with it, like a kit to assemble, an arduino "starter pack" with a breadboard and some rando components, etc.
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Oct 3, 2022 15:08
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HaB posted:Howdy, folks. [url]http://www.zpag.net/Electroniques/Kit/Getting_Started_in_Electronics_-_3ed_-_[Forrest_M.Mims].pdf[/url]
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Oct 3, 2022 15:09
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HaB posted:Howdy, folks. As someone who was in the same boat 1-2 years ago and has made at least some progress since then, I created a cheat sheet of good youtubes that might help. I think I've posted this before in the thread, and I know I'm missing a few. Let me know and I'll add them. Here's the full cheat sheet, including random notes around the bottom. maybe it'll help. Youtube Channels Electronics CuriousMarc literally got me back into studying electronics https://www.youtube.com/c/CuriousMarc so entertaining... and if you keep up with what he says, I'm pretty sure he knows his stuff https://www.youtube.com/c/Electroboom I have to put this here... not only are some of the electronics vids really helpful to understanding the physics, but some others are bat-poo poo insane like check this poo poo out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Tm2c6NJH4Y&t=85s https://www.youtube.com/user/EugeneKhutoryansky So good... maker of the breadboard 6502 thing https://www.youtube.com/c/BenEater Holy crap is this guy really good to learn from. https://www.youtube.com/user/w2aew The grand-daddy of all Electronics Channels. I like him a lot but his voice is super high-pitched https://www.youtube.com/c/EevblogDave Big Clive rules... mostly teardowns and reverse engineering https://www.youtube.com/c/Bigclive Really good electronics/chemistry vids... moves fast. Definitely helpful https://www.youtube.com/c/TheOrganicChemistryTutor Really good basic stuff... some better than others https://www.youtube.com/c/element14presents Really good videos from a professor of a small college. Older vids were better in my opinion https://www.youtube.com/c/DavidWilliams_ca Pretty good build/maker content https://www.youtube.com/c/greatscottlab Hacking stuff together https://www.youtube.com/c/hackaday Mostly audio stuff... I'm impressed he has as many subscribers as he does https://www.youtube.com/user/JohnAudioTech You already know what this is https://www.youtube.com/c/khanacademy seems good, but haven't watched much https://www.youtube.com/c/learnelectronics I really liked the amplifier electronics vids https://www.youtube.com/c/mateoaboytube I like this channel for some reason, even though it's a shill for a paid service https://www.youtube.com/user/mathtutordvd Mostly old radio restoration... I haven't watched a lot https://www.youtube.com/c/MrCarlsonsLab Acconpany's his university course... pretty good to listen to https://www.youtube.com/user/rolinychupetin Just started watching. Kind of teaches stuff in a different way, might be worthwhile https://www.youtube.com/c/RSDAcademy haven't watched a lot, but seems fine https://www.youtube.com/c/Thesignalpath Haven't watched a ton of him, but seems ok https://www.youtube.com/c/ELECTRONOOBS Doesn't really post anymore, but has some useful ones https://www.youtube.com/c/Afrotechmods Television transmitter - Big power stuff. kinda neat https://www.youtube.com/user/TheOnLineEngineer Shows historic videos related to computing history. better than you'd think https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOyJD0RHtF_77_oAf5tT1nQ Same as above the transistor vids are pretty good https://www.youtube.com/user/PeriscopeFilm Seems pretty good https://www.youtube.com/c/TheOffsetVolt Ok vids... a lot of circuit simulation and such https://www.youtube.com/c/FesZElectronics Sparkfun's channel. it's aight https://www.youtube.com/c/sparkfun Keysight company content, has some good vids https://www.youtube.com/c/KeysightLabs Mathematics https://www.youtube.com/c/3blue1brown General Science and Entertainment Frickin awesome, this guy rules https://www.youtube.com/c/AppliedScience Awesome Channel from Fran. Hope she gets here lab situation resolved https://www.youtube.com/c/FranBlanche His series on radio and video is really good/fun https://www.youtube.com/c/TechnologyConnections Mostly does sceptic stuff... I haven't watched a ton, but super popular https://www.youtube.com/c/CaptainDisillusion Mostly discusses old product design decisions. Super awesome https://www.youtube.com/c/CathodeRayDude Veritasium is pretty good mostly https://www.youtube.com/c/veritasium Other good physics stuff https://www.youtube.com/c/Lesics Makes amazing things with a fully stocked machine shop https://www.youtube.com/c/MakerB Demonstrations of sciency stuff https://www.youtube.com/c/HarvardNaturalSciencesLectureDemonstrations Hacker - White hat stuff https://www.youtube.com/user/DeviantOllam Animated Quick takes on Physics stuff https://www.youtube.com/c/minutephysics Entertaining somewhat https://www.youtube.com/c/AlphaPhoenixChannel Entertaining https://www.youtube.com/c/brainiac75 Lego Brick neatness https://www.youtube.com/c/BrickExperimentChannel Physiology as it relates to poisoning https://www.youtube.com/c/ChubbyemuGames Akro-Mils - The name brand of some great storage Circuit to decrease A/C Ripple in a power supply line: Capacitance Multiplier Circuit essentially, increase the capacitance filtering of an RC circuit with a BJT transistor Common Emitter Amplifier Tank circuit
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Oct 3, 2022 22:47
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namlosh posted:As someone who was in the same boat 1-2 years ago and has made at least some progress since then, I created a cheat sheet of good youtubes that might help. I think last time you posted the list someone else suggested Usagi Electric. I hadn't heard of them at the time but boy do they make some good stuff, they're building an entire functioning vacuum tube computer and simultaneously restoring a weird-rear end 1970's minicomputer. e: Also Big Clive has the best most silky voice on all of youtube, I know a lot of people who watch him who aren't even into electronics lol e2: Oh! and BigClive did a video specifically about basic components a while ago that would be a good place to start: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Maq5IyHSuc
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Oct 4, 2022 01:16
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Everybody posted:
Holy crap, y’all. Thanks so much. That is a metric buttload of places to check out!
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Oct 4, 2022 01:45
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To add to the list, I'm a fan of bitluni, I particularly liked his experiments with phased array ultrasonics: https://youtu.be/z4uxC7ISd-c
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Oct 4, 2022 06:26
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This guy is a very good presenter and puts his Caltech EE lectures up pretty much uncut. Whenever I run into one of those subjects that I learned a long time ago but now need a refresher, I check to see if he's got something on the subject. https://www.youtube.com/c/AliHajimiriChannel/videos
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Oct 4, 2022 22:55
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Does somebody want to create a new thread with all these nuggets at some point? This one is well past its prime. There are lots of topics that keep coming up. Like software to use, why no one will answer your hyper specific battery question, and why you don't actually want to simulate every part of your circuit. Also a reminder to always post your schematic if you have a question, otherwise it's like trying to answer a programming question without seeing the code
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Oct 4, 2022 23:40
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HaB posted:Howdy, folks. Ignoring you assumption  , once you know what basic circuit elements do, I think the best way to proceed is to pick a project, get someone to vet that it's not super hard, and then go for it, reading & learning how to do actual problems that come up (e.g. "I want to make this thing run on a different battery, I'm going to go learn about buck/boost converters" or "I want to add an extra motion to this thing, how do I drive a motor from a microcontroller?" It's hard to stick with abstract lessons, and there's also not a substitute for struggling through how to actually design something new vs following along something that already exists.
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Oct 5, 2022 00:09
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I'll throw in a mention for James Bruton for animatronics adjacent stuff, since he's got a series making some dancing robots that perform along with music, as well as just cool robotics projects. https://www.youtube.com/c/jamesbruton/videos
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Oct 5, 2022 00:18
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I can't watch James Bruton. He tries to build everything with hobby grade stuff. When his Arduino isn't fast enough he adds another Arduino, instead of just buying a faster microcontroller and leaving the Arduino framework behind. He ends up spending far more time and money designing something far more complex than it needs to be because he thinks it's "easier". At some point, Arduinos and 3D printing is just not going to cut it, and that point is a long, long way before you get to "I want to design a full scale robot dog".
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Oct 5, 2022 08:01
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Splode posted:I can't watch James Bruton. I thought the same thing for a long time, but at this point I have to grudgingly respect just how far he pushes it
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Oct 5, 2022 08:05
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Oh man, this is all good stuff, but now I have a few hundred hours of youtube backlog to sort through... If we can't get these links plugged into the OP, maybe we can just piggyback off of cruft's electronics swap spreadsheet and put them in a tab over there? Not sure what the general preference is. =============================== On an unrelated note... I'm trying to use this class D amplifier breakout from Adafruit and I'm reading the tutorials and I see this: Adafruit posted:This amplifier is designed to drive moving coil loudpeakers only. Speaker impedence must be 4Ω or more. It's bolded, so I assume it's important.  This makes me feel bad because I am trying to use it to power this speaker and I have a strange hunch that it isn't a moving coil loudspeaker... ...or is it? If I look at the stats, it says "technology: magentic" and then trying to google "magnetic speakers", "magnetic vs moving coil speakers", or "neodymium speaker" doesn't yield anything that makes sense to me. What the heck is this thing I bought?! What happens if I just ignore this and hook them up anyway? (assume I'm using 3.3 Vcc so I don't exceed the 1.2W input power) Will something melt? Or, since the rest of the paragraph is about how the speaker coil acts as a low pass filter, will it work but just sound like crap? Also, how should I pick speakers for this? I mean, the internet says to match power output, so if the amp page recommends 3.2W at 8 ohms, then I should find an 8 ohm speaker that has a max power rating of at least 3.2 watts? ================ e. Just tried doing a search for "what speakers are in cell phones" and got the term "micro speakers". Hmmmmm Cory Parsnipson fucked around with this message at 08:21 on Oct 5, 2022 |
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Oct 5, 2022 08:17
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Whelp, I just learned a, thankfully cheap, lesson in buying cheap components. Picked up 100 packs of 3mm IR LEDs and Receivers on amazon to make some extra sets of eyes for my old paintball gun. Got one all wired up, plugged it in, and the range of detection is only like 1/4"-1/2" and in a very narrow FOV. Tried running the emitter "hot" at 1.5v using my supply and still barely made it further than 1/2". Got the real deal coming, but going from the LEDs costing 15 cents to $1 a pair, which is basically nothing compared to the time it takes to wire it up.
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Oct 5, 2022 08:37
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Cory Parsnipson posted:This makes me feel bad because I am trying to use it to power this speaker and I have a strange hunch that it isn't a moving coil loudspeaker... It is. The other options are moving the magnet (nobody does this because trying to move all of that extra mass doesn’t make sense) and things like electrostatic and piezo that aren't 4/8/16 ohms and don't have a coil like that. Cory Parsnipson posted:What happens if I just ignore this and hook them up anyway? (assume I'm using 3.3 Vcc so I don't exceed the 1.2W input power) Will something melt? Or, since the rest of the paragraph is about how the speaker coil acts as a low pass filter, will it work but just sound like crap? The coil works as an inductor. Class D amplifiers work by switching the output like a buck converter, and it relies on that inductance to keep the current waveform from looking like the voltage waveform (a PWM signal). It may or may not still work with, say, only a piezo tweeter as the load, depending on the design, but it would invalidate a ton of the statements in the datasheet about performance. Stack Machine fucked around with this message at 09:35 on Oct 5, 2022 |
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Oct 5, 2022 09:30
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Stack Machine posted:It is. The other options are moving the magnet (nobody does this because trying to move all of that extra mass doesn’t make sense) and things like electrostatic and piezo that aren't 4/8/16 ohms and don't have a coil like that. Oh I see. That's great then! Thanks. Dang I guess it is pretty obvious that there is a speaker cone in here. It's so small though Cory Parsnipson fucked around with this message at 09:45 on Oct 5, 2022 |
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Oct 5, 2022 09:35
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Bondematt posted:Whelp, I just learned a, thankfully cheap, lesson in buying cheap components. Yeah, good components are worth it. So’a good technique tho, and I’m too scared to use good components without good technique 
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Oct 5, 2022 14:18
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There has to be a better way to design panels than trying to work backwards from a Kicad PCB. It’s good for schematics and basic PCB layouts, but once you need to ensure the panel holes and board components line up it starts to really suck. 
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Oct 5, 2022 19:23
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If you're doing anything moderately challenging in 3D, then you go back and forth between KiCad and a 3D CAD package. I think there is a plugin to easily do it with FreeCAD, but usually I just keep a mental model and sketch out dimensions on a notebook, and then into Fusion 360 at the very end to make sure I didn't gently caress it up
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Oct 5, 2022 19:49
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What I really need is an SVG editor that doesn’t suck as bad as Inkscape. It is dead simple to define plain-rear end rectangles and circles of a certain size and distance away from each other but noooo I have to do some dumbshit file tango.
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Oct 5, 2022 19:53
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every svg editor ive ever used is like that
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Oct 5, 2022 19:55
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ante posted:If you're doing anything moderately challenging in 3D, then you go back and forth between KiCad and a 3D CAD package. Pollyanna, draw a board outline and mounting holes in the 3d package. Export as DXF, and import into kicad and use it to guide your board outline and holes. Export resulting pcb and 3d components into a step (stp?) file and import it back into your 3d package as a solid to check the design. i'm sure there's a better way, but I do this with solidworks and kicad and it works well enough.
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Oct 5, 2022 20:04
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 Guess I’ll actually learn OpenSCAD for once.
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Oct 5, 2022 20:18
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Why would you do that to yourself? Just use OnShape
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Oct 5, 2022 20:28
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Pollyanna posted:
I really like OpenSCAD. It is absolutely not for everyone, though.
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Oct 5, 2022 21:26
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FreeCAD has done the job well enough for my purposes.
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Oct 5, 2022 21:41
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For designing front panels, I like to use Front Panel Designer. 
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Oct 5, 2022 22:37
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Just make a PCB front panel, then you don't need to learn any new software. 
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Oct 5, 2022 22:50
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I've been trying to find good flows for tying together a board edge layout to a front panel .svg that I can import into carbide create or whatnot to mill front panels. Especially it's annoying when you have a pre-existing panel to use, like with the hammond aluminum extrusion cases that come with two nice panels. Figuring out how to lay out the design, match it up with the PCB, correctly mount and align the front panel pieces, then zero it out since they won't be perfectly flat, then mill it.... bleh. The results are awfully nice though, but it's soooo much loving work. I did some boards that went in some hammond 1455's like these: https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/hammond-manufacturing/1455C802/460161 And they came out great but... so much freaking math to do and triple-check.
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Oct 5, 2022 23:14
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Pollyanna posted:What I really need is an SVG editor that doesn’t suck as bad as Inkscape. It is dead simple to define plain-rear end rectangles and circles of a certain size and distance away from each other but noooo I have to do some dumbshit file tango. In fusion 360's sketch editor it's very easy to layout shapes like that (you can place rectangles etc. then size and position them with dimensions as you like). There's a plugin available that exports svg. If you want a more complex/complete solution, I believe you can also export a STEP file from KiCAD to get a 3d model of the board in F360 and then use the projection function to replicate component outlines etc. into a sketch as needed. Fusion 360 is free for hobbyist/non-commercial users with some function limitations that won't bother you.
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Oct 6, 2022 00:53
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Hobnob posted:In fusion 360's sketch editor it's very easy to layout shapes like that (you can place rectangles etc. then size and position them with dimensions as you like). There's a plugin available that exports svg. Yeah this is exactly what I do and it works pretty well.
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Oct 6, 2022 03:09
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cruft posted:I really like OpenSCAD.  I like things that can be called from scripts and makefiles and kept in version control with all of the nice plain-text-only features of version control like line-by-line attribution and commit-to-commit diffs. Like doing documents in LaTeX it's great for collaboration if you find yourself collaborating with other people who can stomach it. Also I imagine if "documents in LaTeX" sounds like a bad time to you, openscad will be too.
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Oct 6, 2022 03:16
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I’m a computer toucher by trade (a sentence that will not age well in a hundred years) so I’m used to translating requirements, specifications, and patterns into code. OpenSCAD is fine. What really screws me over is the lack of 3D models for my components (Alpha pots, NKK switches, QingPu jacks) and my own laziness (I ain’t making them). I’m hitting up Mouser anyway, might as well use other components… …whiiiich inspires me to condense a couple components down to one on my board! Cool. Pollyanna fucked around with this message at 14:14 on Oct 6, 2022 |
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Oct 6, 2022 14:11
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Pollyanna posted:I’m a computer toucher by trade (a sentence that will not age well in a hundred years) so I’m used to translating requirements, specifications, and patterns into code. OpenSCAD is fine. Google around for like "[component name] STEP" if the manufacturer's website doesn't have CAD models, sometimes you can find a model for them someone else made that way. Gotta double check it's accurate of course, but it's saved me a lot of time in the past.
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Oct 6, 2022 14:17
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They all want me to pay money  Edit: or at least they expect me to use my work email. This is a hobby, not a job. Edit 2 fiiiine snapeda works Pollyanna fucked around with this message at 15:00 on Oct 6, 2022 |
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Oct 6, 2022 14:21
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added Usagi Electric has some of the coolest content ever. buuuut, for some weird reason, I just can't stand him. something about his cadence or voice or speech patterns annoys me. I recognize that this is my issue, and I'm worse for it. added added added Cory Parsnipson posted:electronics swap spreadsheet and put them in a tab
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Oct 6, 2022 16:36
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ante posted:Does somebody want to create a new thread with all these nuggets at some point? This one is well past its prime. Sorry for doublepost, but this is a really good idea.
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Oct 6, 2022 16:38
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