Equipment for Electronics Lab

I'm setting up a hobbyist electronics lab. What kind of equipment
should I buy to equip this lab? My budget is $3000.

 

[CDESC]

Hello.
Here is a short list of the content of a basic hobby lab... I'll try not to
forget too much!

- Precision and standard screwdrivers sets (~15$)
- Precision pliers of all kinds (~10$)
- A good wire cutter (the kind used to cut excess leads under pcbs) (~5$)
- A set of tweezers (~20$)
- A lab power supply (~100$)
- If your budget allows it, an oscilloscope is always useful (~350$+)
- A multimeter (~50$)
- A breadboard or two with jumper wires (~30$)
- A soldering iron and soldering wire (~40$)
- A de-soldering pump (aka a sucker) (~5$)
- Aligator clips are always good (~5$)

- Lots, Lots, Lots, Lots and Lots of assorted parts of all kinds. ICs,
Transistors, Resistors, Capacitors, Pots, everything you can get. (~1500$+)

- Prototyping PCBs or blank PCBs with everything needed to etch them might
be useful if you intend to keep your projects in one piece. There are
several techniques so the hardware will vary.

If you're going to work with programmable ICs, SMD/SMT and the such, I
suggest to consider the following too:
- A SMD rework station (hot air gun) (~100$)
- A pick and place vacuum pen
- A set of wax carver tools (these are useful to manipulate parts,
straighten small IC pins, etc.) (~15$)
- A microscope (~100$ to 300$)
- A programmer (the Willem kind is fine as it covers most of the basic
programmable ICs out there) (~35$)
- A computer dedicated to your hobby room (running with the project board
all over the house isnt a good idea) (~I bet you have an extra one!)
- A signal/function generator is not a must but might save your day, one
day. (~200$)

For added paranoia, or if you're going to work with expensive or sensitive
microcontrollers, get an anti-electrostatic mat for your desktop
and/or an electrostatic protection wirst strap.

The rest is up to your needs depending on your specific projects and the
type of work you're gonna do.

All of that hardware can be found on eBay. The prices I gave are based on
what I remember (or think I remember) I paid.


<sodaant@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:dadb5398-6838-4895-9cf6-970c7de09c79@g16g2000pri.googlegroups.com...

I'm setting up a hobbyist electronics lab. What kind of equipment
should I buy to equip this lab? My budget is $3000.

 

[John Larkin]

On Sat, 31 May 2008 13:03:50 GMT, Ecnerwal
<LawrenceSMITH@SOuthernVERmont.NyET> wrote:

In article
dadb5398-6838-4895-9cf6-970c7de09c79@g16g2000pri.googlegroups.com>,
sodaant@gmail.com wrote:

I'm setting up a hobbyist electronics lab. What kind of equipment
should I buy to equip this lab? My budget is $3000.

"What you need" depends a huge amount on what you plan to do. Radio,
microprocessors, audio, ...

One approach is to buy stuff as your hobby project of the moment
requires - that will tend to match up your equipment to what you are
actually doing, or have done, rather than tying up bunches of money in
things you never use for your particular projects. If you are somewhat
vague about projects, start in with things you need - you can build
power supplies, buy kits to build meters, etc.

Oscilloscope (but there's a huge range, depending on what you plan to
do.) Big differences are Analog .vs. Digital, number of channels, and
speed.

Function generator

Frequency counter (perhaps, depending...)

Spectrum analyzer (perhaps, depending, but even old ones will probably
blow your budget, so perhaps not)

Most digital scopes nowadays, even the sub-$1000 ones, will measure
frequency and do basic spectral analysis. A decent color digital scope
is worth it.

John

 

[Tim Wescott]

Ecnerwal wrote:

In article
dadb5398-6838-4895-9cf6-970c7de09c79@g16g2000pri.googlegroups.com>,
sodaant@gmail.com wrote:

I'm setting up a hobbyist electronics lab. What kind of equipment
should I buy to equip this lab? My budget is $3000.

"What you need" depends a huge amount on what you plan to do. Radio,
microprocessors, audio, ...

One approach is to buy stuff as your hobby project of the moment
requires - that will tend to match up your equipment to what you are
actually doing, or have done, rather than tying up bunches of money in
things you never use for your particular projects. If you are somewhat
vague about projects, start in with things you need - you can build
power supplies, buy kits to build meters, etc.

Oscilloscope (but there's a huge range, depending on what you plan to
do.) Big differences are Analog .vs. Digital, number of channels, and
speed.

Function generator

Frequency counter (perhaps, depending...)

Spectrum analyzer (perhaps, depending, but even old ones will probably
blow your budget, so perhaps not)

Soldering tools - a combined iron/hot air system is one approach.

Anti-static (not essential for some things, but cheap enough to just do
right once - get a good rubber bench mat and wrist-band)

meter(s) - multimeter, perhaps more than one or some dedicated less
capable meters (advantage being that you can look at two parameters at
once if you have more than one meter). Simpler meters have the advantage
of being dirt cheap. One that does L/C (inductance/capacitance) is
invaluable, especially if getting used parts by scrapping old equipment,
as the markings are often obscure - or if winding your own inductors.

Power supplies

Parts to play with - resistors, capacitors, transistors, diodes,
op-amps, ...

cables, wires, breadboards etc.

I can't second this advise more. You need to buy what you're going to

want, and beyond the very basics you can't know that until you've been
doing it for a while. I suggest you start by spending $200 to $500 now,
and stash the remainder under a cabinet or in a special bank account (at
least in the US banks are quite happy to let you open a second account,
which makes it easy to separate your money).

That much money will get you a ton of basic equipment, or about 1/20th
of a top-of-the-line oscilloscope. So you _do_ want to figure out what
you want to spend your money on before it's all gone.

I also suggest that before you buy anything beyond pliers, multimeter,
wire cutters and soldering iron, that you sit down and answer the
question "is there a way that I can do this job with the equipment that
I have". There are many pieces of specialized equipment that will do a
job fast, and are essential for a profitable business, that you can
replace with basic equipment and time spent in careful work in a
hobbyist shop.

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Do you need to implement control loops in software?
"Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems" gives you just what it says.
See details at http://www.wescottdesign.com/actfes/actfes.html

 

[John Larkin]

On Sun, 1 Jun 2008 16:09:24 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
<zapwireDASHgroups@yahoo.com> wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message
news:90v244t4cef5sosegskm1i12pt3nr7mer9@4ax.com...
Most digital scopes nowadays, even the sub-$1000 ones, will measure
frequency and do basic spectral analysis.

John knows this, but for others: The dynamic range of a scope is usually
little better than ~50dB. If you find yourself liking what you're seeing on a
scope's spectral display, but want to dig out weaker signals, any old
purpose-built spectrum analyzer (read: something cheap you can buy used) will
generally give at least 90dB dynamic range -- much more useful for, e.g., low
level RF work or sniffing around boards for EMC checks.

Yeah, the fft's are mediocre. I found one of my guys complaining about
some huge odd harmonic distortion on a sine wave. Turns out he'd
cranked up the volts/div knob to better resolve the distortion, and
overloaded the front end, turning the signal into a square wave.

John

 

[John Larkin]

On Sun, 1 Jun 2008 17:09:39 -0700, "BobW"
<nimby_NEEDSPAM@roadrunner.com> wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message
newshd6449dlf22uqd3nos7chlpuiefvb5qsq@4ax.com...
On Sun, 1 Jun 2008 16:09:24 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
zapwireDASHgroups@yahoo.com> wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in
message
news:90v244t4cef5sosegskm1i12pt3nr7mer9@4ax.com...
Most digital scopes nowadays, even the sub-$1000 ones, will measure
frequency and do basic spectral analysis.

John knows this, but for others: The dynamic range of a scope is usually
little better than ~50dB. If you find yourself liking what you're seeing
on a
scope's spectral display, but want to dig out weaker signals, any old
purpose-built spectrum analyzer (read: something cheap you can buy used)
will
generally give at least 90dB dynamic range -- much more useful for, e.g.,
low
level RF work or sniffing around boards for EMC checks.


Yeah, the fft's are mediocre. I found one of my guys complaining about
some huge odd harmonic distortion on a sine wave. Turns out he'd
cranked up the volts/div knob to better resolve the distortion, and
overloaded the front end, turning the signal into a square wave.

John


Jheez! He must be a young guy.

Yes, but very smart. He won't do that again.

Why can't they be like we were? Perfect, in every way. What's the matter
with kids today?

Partly the problem that there's about 50x more stuff to learn.

John

 

[John Fields]

On Sun, 1 Jun 2008 17:09:39 -0700, "BobW"
<nimby_NEEDSPAM@roadrunner.com> wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in message
newshd6449dlf22uqd3nos7chlpuiefvb5qsq@4ax.com...
On Sun, 1 Jun 2008 16:09:24 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
zapwireDASHgroups@yahoo.com> wrote:

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote in
message
news:90v244t4cef5sosegskm1i12pt3nr7mer9@4ax.com...
Most digital scopes nowadays, even the sub-$1000 ones, will measure
frequency and do basic spectral analysis.

John knows this, but for others: The dynamic range of a scope is usually
little better than ~50dB. If you find yourself liking what you're seeing
on a
scope's spectral display, but want to dig out weaker signals, any old
purpose-built spectrum analyzer (read: something cheap you can buy used)
will
generally give at least 90dB dynamic range -- much more useful for, e.g.,
low
level RF work or sniffing around boards for EMC checks.


Yeah, the fft's are mediocre. I found one of my guys complaining about
some huge odd harmonic distortion on a sine wave. Turns out he'd
cranked up the volts/div knob to better resolve the distortion, and
overloaded the front end, turning the signal into a square wave.

John


Jheez! He must be a young guy.

Why can't they be like we were? Perfect, in every way. What's the matter
with kids today?

---
They are just impossible to control, with their awful clothes and
their rock an' roll.

JF

 

On May 30, 10:34 pm, "CDESC" <feedb...@realitymedias.com> wrote:

The rest is up to your needs depending on your specific projects and the
type of work you're gonna do.

I guess I forgot to mention this, didn't I?

I intend to work mostly with micro controllers, such as the AVR and
the Propeller chip, and with various peripherals such as motion
sensors, pressure sensors, and motor controllers.

Does this knowledge change the list?