Ok, sort of diy, but mostly just mining the great font of knowledge that is uk.d-i-y
Eldest daughter is 9yo, we have a variety of electrical kits as well batteries, bulbs, switches, buzzers etc. which she has fiddled with over the years. Now looking to learn a bit more about electronics, learning to solder etc.
It's not an area I know a lot about, I understand the basics of the different components, I can sort of solder, but haven't for ages, and it was generally a bit rubbish anyway, but that's about it. so we need to start simple :-)
So I'm looking for suggestions of some resources to help us learn a bit about this - online, books whatever.
If you want a one-stop book that takes you from the basics, through to the fairly advanced - have a look at "The Art of Electronics" Horowitz & Hill, Cambridge University Press.
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a cheap book, but look around for secondhand copies, or student special offers etc.
You should also be aware of the following suppliers: -
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these sites have kits of components to make various educational projects. In addition, MUTR has all sorts of interesting materials for all science disciplines.
Think that's a bit over the top for a nine year old, though a good book.
One of the authors is regulary pestered on sci.electronics.design to finish the new edition, which I want on my shelf - and am not lending it to anyone else this time ...
No help to Chris, but what a pity that kits are not sold in toy shops these days. When I were a lad, there were plenty of kits available, for electronics and other engineering themes. Philips, Tri-ang and Lionel come to mind. I'm sure a lot of people reading this group had Philips Engineer kits, or something similar, 40 - 50 years ago.
The kits are still available. Maplins have one. It appears to use components embedded in plastic blocks that can be plugged together. It might be a better option than buying parts and a soldering iron.
Maplins have (had? it's year or more since I last looked...) several "electronics" kits, some with a base board of springs or:
Snap circuits, this is what I bought for the lad (the full big set). I think it's better than the spring type as the parts do simply snap together, springs are very fiddly. It's also totally flexable, you can build what ever you like, not just the things in the book. I'm not sure the spring type systems are quite so flexable.
I think so, something soldered is a little more permenant. Prototype with the kit then build a proper one on vero board soldering etc.
Others have given good advice, particularly sites like MUTR
I'd actually play down the electronics hardware side, in favour of a bit more software and boards like the Arduino. This needs a 20 quid board, a computer with internet and a USB connection, and as much breadboard / LEDs / switches as you can muster. The board is reusable and if you ever want a cheaper one for a permanent project, they're available as a minimal Boarduino for a tenner.
The difficulty with kids and electronics is that the goalposts are a lot higher than they were when I was that age. When I was a kid, any electronics was expensive, I had no electronic toys and so anything I'd built myself was immediately leading edge. Nowadays there are Furbies in charity shops for pocket money, so how do you get kids to make something that's simple enough to achieve, yet complex enough to be interesting in comparison to their Nintenpods?
One way is the Arduino. Probably the best of the contemporary low-cost controllers (beats a PIC hands-down) it's cheap to set up (computer, ready-built Arduino, USB cable), easy to program, and it also has good hardware IO built in. Integrating LEDs, switches, =A34 eBay radio control servoes or high-current drives to motors is easy. It's even easy to link it to a program running on a host computer, so you can make a web-activated robot widget or a "Has my team won or lost yet?" servo flag-waver.
You can also expand the electronics side as you go. Integrate a GPS, accelerometer, gyroscope or laser distance measurer (all cheap components and easy).
There's a "Make" series book out there - the whole Make magazine and on-line community is a real resurgence for electronics hobbyists. Massimo Banzi's "Getting started with Arduino" is a good book for from- scratch projects with kids. For something deeper, I'd suggest Oxer & Blemings' "Practical Arduino".
That's the "tediously studied calculus" through to the "obsolete twenty years ago" Probably the worst (and most expensive) book you could give any kid with an interest in electronics. If that doesn't kill their interest, nothing will.
The kits on Rapid's (rapidonline) contain educational tie-in information such as what school "stages" they are deemed suitable for. That will give you some place to start, looking to see which kits are simpler and which are more demanding. You don't mention in the OP, but if you haven't already got them I'd suggest buyng a smallish variable power supply (will be cheaper and more versatile than relying on batteries, which I always forget to disconnect), a cheap digital multimeter and a prototype board wth *lots* of jumpers for making some of the ciruits. e.g. Rapid's part number 34-0650
If its the book I'm thinking of, I so agree. Electronics books aren't that useful for a kid with the interweb, times have changed.
When it comes to young kids kits, I like the boards with springs on. The projects it comes with are simple, but more usefully you can then pull all the components off the back of the board, get a half kilo of assorted components and build things by stringing components between the springs, thus instantly gettting twice as many connection points. Then you can put more springs on the board & add some bigger external bits like speaker, piezo speaker, relays, coloured 12v bulbs and suitable psu etc. When things get more advanced I'd go to prototyping boards & soldering.
Philips, hitachi denshi cube kits etc work, but they're restrictive, they focus the mind on other non-relevant things, and you get much less per given spend.
Always the big issue is generating interest, everything else either comes after that or doesnt exist.
A pocket multimeter would be good. A power supply isn't needed in this age of excess wallwarts. Rapid online is a good supplier. A good second source of parts is domestic scrap electronic appliances, you can get all sorts of bits you won't pick up at the usual component suppliers that way.
I'd try and explore what the kid fancies in terms of circuits and technologies (eg valves, relay logic, electrolysis, etc) rather than throw a standard package at them, which frankly are pretty boring.
Soldering: 20-25w iron & flux cored lead solder. Total cleanliness is the first thing to learn with soldering, then doing it quick enough not to kill the trannies. Trannies have rights too you know.
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