OT: Generic UK-based electronics NG?

I don't think there is. There's uk.d-i-y (more generalist) or sci.electronics.design (international, typically US bias). Other sci.electronics.* groups are somewhat quieter but worth subscribing too.

Other groups slightly more off-piste are comp.sys.raspberry-pi and comp.arch.embedded but those are more software focused.

I'd probably start in sci.electronics.design and put up with the US-isms, as most electronics is fairly international anyway.

Theo

These were in the active list not long back but I've not tried them for a while.

comp.publish.electronic.misc alt.music.makers.electronic sci.chem.electrochem sci.chem.electrochem.battery sci.electronics.basics sci.electronics.cad sci.electronics.components sci.electronics.design sci.electronics.equipment sci.electronics.misc sci.electronics.repair sci.physics.electromag alt.books.electronic rec.boats.electronics uk.tech.electronic-security misc.industry.electronics.marketplace

Bob.

I would wonder what kind of answer you were expecting.

Some of the greats, have retired. One gentleman had written a textbook, and he is no longer around.

Does Big Clive hang out in USENET ? He knows a thing or two.

And you can always visit a library, and use the stacks there. Find a uni textbook on circuit design.

You'll have a harder time, finding things like transimpedance amplifier.

There's synthesis and analysis. Those are the two activities. When you're repairing your TV set, that's analysis. When you are turning a LED on and off, that's synthesis.

Where the country specific aspect comes in, is in the parts cabinet. And the transistor numbering. There should be just as many "functions", on either side of the Atlantic.

And some parts, you can't get them on either side of the Atlantic, and they're only available in Japan. For example, high value ceramic caps (25uf 15V maybe), tend to be Japan only. There are some components that are not widely distributed. They are usually near the ends of a parts table (obscure value). I have a handful of those ceramic caps in my bicycle light :-)

Paul

I strongly recommend the book The Art of Electronics by Horowitz and Hill.

Also...the lab book that goes with it. Can be used on its own, and is a bit easier for a beginner. "Learning The Art of Electronics".

For the very keen, there is the stuff they couldn't fit in the third edition. "The X Chapters".

I have all three!

He used to post here, but not for many years.

I have a feeling that the OP is looking for a discussion forum rather than a subject reference. I learned on these, in those days from my local library:

Elektor magazine still exists, but is pretty much only available from Smith's. Tandy went decades ago, and Maplin left the high street quite a few years back. The demand for components has just dropped off, and RS/Farnell/Rapid now sell to the public, and Maplin is still going online. Or DigiKey or Mouser if you have more exotic needs.

Depends what you want to do. Tools like KiCAD have made professional standard schematic capture and pcb design available to everyone at no cost. PCBs can now be manufactured very cheaply at prices well within the reach of the hobbyist.

The OP was interested in analogue electronics - The Art of Electronics covers this area very well. The various web forums for electronics suffer from people propagating half understood “facts” and folklore.

I have a "Green" subscription so get it as PDF, but you can have a paper subscription as well.

Tandy went decades ago, and Maplin left the high street

Maplin folded and was bought by another company. I see it does sell components.

The demand for components has just dropped off,

There are a few more suppliers, Rapid, Greenweld,

I have found ebay and aliexpress to be great sources of components, just don't buy transistors from aliexpress.

And I get PCBS made in China.

This allows me to hang analog IO around my Rasbeberry PI Picos and I can also print 3d cases/

The result is neat professional and to my needs

The point is not that you cant get the kit,but that the point of doing electronics at all is somewhat lessened.

I qualified as an analogue electronic engineer, and within 10 years the field had shrunk to high power, radio frequency and specialised.

You no longer built a circuit: You bought a chip.

Then within another ten years, you didn't even buy a chip, you bought a computer instead and learnt to program it,

Times change, but if you want to do old school, then look at Aliexpress. I fixed my very old loudspeakers using parts sourced from China - voice coils, spiders, foam surrounds.

None of this is available in the UK like it used to be.

Quality from Aliexpress can be 'interesting'. Watch out for fakes or substandard parts.

Another supplier is lcsc.com who are a branch of the popular JLCPCB board fab. LCSC are kind of like a Chinese Farnell, and they will combine shipping with your PCB order.

Judging from Big Clive's videos, there's still funky analogue techniques out there but they're to save a few cents on the product, not to achieve great things. A hobbyist isn't bothered by the few cents, so doing the funky thing to cut the corner doesn't really make sense.

Where it does make more sense is in high power stuff - saving a power MOSFET with a chunky heatsink is more valuable than saving a 3 cent SOT23.

Aliexpress is excellent for buying subassemblies, if you pay attention so you know what you're getting. There's both good and bad stuff out there.

They have a new feature called 'Choice', which is kind of like a free Amazon Prime where they collect all your orders and ship them in a single parcel, to arrive within 5 days (used to be 7 days). Works pretty well in my experience.

Some of it is, but it's just the same Chinese stuff with faster shipping.

Theo

At three times the cost, or more

I get it by mail order from Elektor.

-- My posts are my copyright and if @diy_forums or Home Owners' Hub wish to copy them they can pay me £1 a message. Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:

Yes, I'm using Aliexpress a lot now. Can't find some stuff locally at all. I was repairing an old Marshall guitar amp for a Repair Cafe, and I can get the obsolete op-amp chips in 10's from China including P&P for less than UK postage would cost, if I could even find them here.

You do have to test the stuff. I bought 10 bistable latching relays, 8 work. I have some TMS4164 chips (64k dynamic memory used in 40+ year old minicomputer) on order to replace some dead chips on a 512Mb memory board. I'm wondering about knocking up a raspberry pi test rig for them, or just socketing them on the memory board and relying on that to pick up the errors. The board does have Hamming error detection/correction, and very helpfully tells me which chips are dead.

I used to be a heavy user of CPC (several of us at work had a shared personal account that clocked up over £25k in orders in one year). They died when they stopped printing a catalogue as their website just can't find stuff you know they sell, and then their stock range started plummeting and you could no longer get much of what you were after for any one project. I still do maybe one order a year.

I've not used China for that yet, but the UK supplier I did use (Ragworm) has vanished, and I will need more boards soon.

I also use Cool Components (nice guy), Switch Electronics and (more focused) the PiHut.

Yes, I first knew him on sci.engr.lighting (that's dead now - the more active users setup an equivalent on Linked-in).

I've had some stuff that didn't approach the description when I was after battery operated LED PIR lights - almost always a full refund, no questions asked.

I had forgotten about "Cool Components". They have saved me from problems in the past...

Dave