[sdiy] favorite Youtube genre - "old guys repairing electronics"

sleepy_dog at gmx.de sleepy_dog at gmx.de
Sat Oct 31 12:57:09 CET 2020 

Heh. If I need something quickly, cant wait for PCB, but also it does
have certain physical dimension requirements,
then I do get really "boring" and do "plan" perfboard - "what is the fun
in that" someone asked - indeed, what is the fun in that sort of
tedious, repetitive work alltogether?
Better make it as short as, and least error prone possible. It's so much
easier to reason about misbehavior of a circuit if it actually matches
what you have drawn - at least from the obvious (not parasitic)
components and their supposed connections.
While it's perhaps reasonabnly unlikely to make mistakes if you have all
the space in the world and basically solder together the circuit
as-is-drawn on some big ass perfboard, also leaving lots of room for
adding more stuff to experiment,
as things get more crowded and less intuitively placed, I found the
following to be helpful:

First of all, esp. for single-sided perfboard, I like to combine THT ICs
with SMT 0805 passives, as you can often put them comfortably between
legs and under the IC (on the bottom side of the board), that already
saves a lot of space - and wiring effort.
There are also these, often green, plated-through double-sided
perfboards - may reduce the insulated connections you have to make
(which take longer due to the need for burning away the insulation /
tinning), e.g. all GND with silver wire on the bottom, +V on the top
side, or so, other nets with insulated wire, where unconnected crossings
would be at least.

Also, in the type of scenario where I would, if I could, prefer a small
PCB, but don't want to wait,
I might already have a captured schematic in my chosen EDA software
anyway - or if it's small, I'll just do it quickly.
Then convert to PCB, and usually don't route anything, or at best a few
special traces to mark special preferences.

I put that on my small-ish tablet with stylus support, that actually
fits on my crowded soldering bench.
that also runs the EDA software. Then I:

foreach non-GND-net:
     highlight net in PCB software
     connect all net points in circuit with insulated "coil wire",
point-to-point
     hide net's ratlines (or color existing traces) to make visible
what's still TODO - this shrinks more and more, and you can see the
light at the end of the tunnel

This, for me anyway, proved much less error prone than staring on a
paper printout and comparing it with the current physical as-is
schematic all the time (even when pencil checking traces ;) ).
Can basically do that half-asleep without making a mistake. (just make
sure to display the bottom side mirrored appropriately :D)

Then for the GND net I do the above, except I user silver coated copper
wire, a bit sturdier, and wherever possible, do not cut, but bend around
corners, using one long piece of wire across many connections, saving
some work steps. The silver wire will be over all those coil wires,
holding them in place a bit better, esp. longer ones, and make it less
likely that you will rip off any connection by accidentally grabbing too
hard anywhere.


- Steve


Am 31.10.2020 um 11:23 schrieb ShedSynth:
>
> Hi all.
>
> I use perfboard, but I don’t try to make it into a PCB.
>
> I wire point-to-point with single core Kynar wire, normally used for
> wire-wrapping.
>
> I use blue, black, red and yellow on the back for -12V, GND, +5V and +12V.
>
> I use green for all signals, always on the component side.
>
> I lay out the big things like pots, DIL sockets and capacitors on the
> board itself, and always try to leave rows of 4 holes to place
> resistors flat.
>
> Then I follow the schematic, which might take several days – this
> isn’t a mass-production process.
>
> I separate each functional block with a pair of pins + a jumper so I
> can test on the scope as I go and also so I can bodge blocks of
> completed circuits into something else.
>
> Hope this might help somebody,
>
> Al
>
> If the picture comes through, it’s most of a Thomas Henry MAXIMUS 3340
> VCO.
>
> The front is just as ugly.
>
> *From:*Synth-diy <synth-diy-bounces at synth-diy.org> *On Behalf Of
> *Timothy Burns
> *Sent:* 30 October 2020 15:17
> *Cc:* SYNTH DIY <synth-diy at synth-diy.org>
> *Subject:* Re: [sdiy] favorite Youtube genre - "old guys repairing
> electronics"
>
> Good lord, I wish I watched this yesterday. Also what the heck, did he
> /plan/ before he started soldering in components? What fun is that?
>
> Thanks for the suggestions of video and audio channels, this will be
> great to have on hand as I re-solder everything from the last 36 hours.
>
> I'm not saying I'm going to start now, but does anyone have
> suggestions software or shortcuts for planning perfboard builds?
> Fritzling? (Asking for a friend.)
>
> Thanks All!
>
> Tim
>
> On Fri, Oct 30, 2020 at 10:34 AM Ryan B8S <ryan at pimpdroid.com
> <mailto:ryan at pimpdroid.com>> wrote:
>
>     Not an old guy, but I can't believe no one mentioned Synth Chaser
>     at Synth Chaser dot com.
>
>     https://www.youtube.com/c/SynthChaser/videos
>
>     My favorite youtube channel by an order of magnitude.
>
>     On Wed, Oct 21, 2020 at 7:08 PM David Simpson
>     <davidosimpson at gmail.com <mailto:davidosimpson at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>         I recently found this video and was astonished by the skill,
>         technique quietude ala Bob Villa.
>
>         How to solder grid style PCB / 555 PWM DC-motor driver
>         (EEEL1-3) <https://youtu.be/_ypW45Y8VSs>
>
>         What are your favorite channels for informative/instructive
>         electronics repair? Preferable those who don't yell or are in
>         a constant state of outrage...
>
>
>         --
>
>         david o. simpson | cameraperson | binarymob.com
>         <http://binarymob.com> | earth
>
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