Beginner Components?

[JacobEdward]

I'm new to electronics and have been teaching myself as I go but I keep discovering new components that have really essential functionality (like comparators or digital potentiometers) and was wondering if anybody would be willing to list off anything really basic (along with a cheap part number I can experiment with) that you would think is a must for beginners to learn.

I've only really heard of/ experimented with:

relays
motion sensors
switch's
transistors
potentiometers
digital potentiometers
resistors
capacitors
diodes
microcontroller
LED's and Lazer Diodes
Photoresistor
Shift Registers
Multimeter
Servo and toy motors
Ultrasonic Transducer
RFID
Op Amp
555
Thermistor
Barometric Pressure Sensor

--------------------------ADDENDUM--------------------------

Incase anybody in the future might find this post of any use... if you're a beginner like me and are looking for cheap parts to experiment with or discover, this site has been pretty useful

http://www.taydaelectronics.com/

[xrunner]

I think you've got the basic stuff covered. 

[LaurentR]

The two "Make: Electronics" books are pretty decent for very basic electronics stuff.
They also have 2 matched packs of components to do the circuits in the book. You might want to look at the books themselves (depending on where you're at right now) and the kits (or at least the list of components in the kits).
This is the link to the whole thing. Linkes to the books and the kits are included:
http://www.makershed.com/products/make-electronics-the-complete-collection

Jameco (in the US) has similar (unbranded) kits:
http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10001_10001_2129115_-1
http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10001_10001_2129123_-1
Again you may want to look at the inventory in these kits.

They also have a bunch of assortments of parts and interesting kits, all reasonably priced - worth browsing through their catalog.

If you want to read about components, the fist two volumes of "Encyclopedia of Electronic Components" by Charles Platt are easy reads. You'll find more in the (fairly) definitive and poorly named "Practical Electronics for Inventors" by Paul Scherz.

[JacquesBBB]

You'll find more in the (fairly) definitive and poorly named "Practical Electronics for Inventors" by Paul Scherz.

I support this view.  The book "Practical electronics for inventors" by Paul Scherz and Simon Monk  is a good book for beginners, despite many misprints that remain through editions. It contains a  quite complete list of basic parts (section 7.5.21   of    chapter 7 : hands on Electronics).  The table is barely readable in the kindle edition, but you should prefer the printed version of the book which is only 22.6$ (at amazon for example) and well printed.

[Simon]

is this a joke ?

[JacquesBBB]

is this a joke ?

What do you mean ? Be more specific please.

[Seppy]

Perhaps have a look into:

• zeners
• inductors
• LDO's
• MOSFETS

Just as a sidenote, don't be afraid of surface mount components, in many cases they are easier to use and almost always cheaper than their through hole counterparts.

[JacobEdward]

Lol, I have been avoiding surface mounted components, but that's because I don't have a regular place to solder things into place at the moment... actually that's something I've been wondering about... sure you save space with surface mounted components, but if components where built more like legos where you could just pull them in and out whenever there was a need... there would be a lot less waste and it would remove a barrier to entry for beginners... are there any other justifications besides space for not just having slots for the components to plug into (I've seen fuses that are mounted like this such as in cars, but why not capacitors, transformers, resistors, etc.)

[Simon]

Lol, I have been avoiding surface mounted components, but that's because I don't have a regular place to solder things into place at the moment... actually that's something I've been wondering about... sure you save space with surface mounted components, but if components where built more like legos where you could just pull them in and out whenever there was a need... there would be a lot less waste and it would remove a barrier to entry for beginners... are there any other justifications besides space for not just having slots for the components to plug into (I've seen fuses that are mounted like this but why not capacitors, transformers, resistors, etc.)

I'm afraid it's down to our usual friend of cost and profits. You would still need to solder something wouldn't you? There are many reasons to use surface mount over through-hole, firstly as you suggest space and secondly shorter leads work better at high frequencies so you will never find something that works for example in a satellite receiver made with through-hole components it just won't work.

Through-hole components are also a righteous pain in the arsehole to assemble onto boards, it is quite a laborious and manual operation. There may be machines that can do it but I would expect it much more complicated than surface mount. Surface mount components are fitted with pick and place machines which can place many components in a second. Because they do not have leads that have to go through holes and simply sit on solder pads on the board the whole assembly process is quicker and cheaper to automate. The boards are coated in the correct places with solder paste, the components are placed on the board with pick and place machines and then the whole thing goes through an oven often all three of these operations done on one assembly line in one take this is something that is more difficult to achieve with surface mount. These days militarisation is generally key and many parts are not even produced in through-hole because large-scale manufacturers do not want them so us mere mortals have to resort to various break out boards.

[JacobEdward]

Fucking militarism... we really gotta get off of that...

Anyways, besides motors, what's a good inductor part for general use or experimenting with (same with zener and LDO)?  I have a bunch of bipolar transistors, is it really necessary to use MOSFETs?

Is it a pain to solder a surface mount manually?

[Simon]

You use the parts you need, the question is more, what are you trying to do ?

[JacobEdward]

Well, at the moment I'm just trying to prove a bunch of the concepts empirically and then I was going to start building basically everything I could think of... btw, aren't there through hole adapter cartridges or something?  That would make sense if there's a demand and people who don't want to manually solder things in the development phase are looking for an easier way to interface with these things...

[Simon]

You want a breadboard, the problem with breadboards is that components end up going all over the place and you have long wires so they are not any good over a certain frequency, Don't try building a discrete smps on one

[JacobEdward]

I've got a breadboard, but the surface mounts would still need a cartridge to interface with the breadboard, right?

Btw, do you know any good cheap part numbers for inductors, LDO's or zener diodes?

[Simon]

where do you normally buy parts ?, see what they have. Inductors will be very specific of what you want to do, your best bet is to find a project to work on and buy the parts you need for it.

[WattsUp]

I will get hate for this but on eBay I've seen a set of 200 different inductors for a couple of quid. As a beginner buying sets of different values will insure that you have basic parts to hand (mostly). I would also say grab some 74xx or similar logic, it's really interesting to build up a 1 bit adder for the first time. Even better buy a crap load of BJTs and learn how to make some simples gates with them. BTW getting SMD adapters are an inefficient way of prototyping. Either stick to THT for learning and designing, and move on to SMD for production, or discover the art of dead bug wiring if a part is unavailable.
Ben

[Simon]

Well there are good and bad on ebay, I'm one of the good guys

Some parts just don't exist in through hole

[WattsUp]

  From what I've seen on the forum, there is a general consensus that components on eBay are all bad and doomed to fail. I for one always buy from eBay, as it's the only way I can get stuff. In 3 years, not one part has failed me. I actually think i have bought an ATmega kit thing from you (with crystal, caps and socket?).

[JacobEdward]

I normally buy them off of ebay since I'm not the richest person in the world lol... btw, what does 74xx, BJT, BTW, SMD and THT stand for?

What else would be a good beginner project that would illustrate the concept of induction, or anything you think would be fundamental (also if you could link to the projects you just mentioned that would be awesome)?  I'm already on a project trying to triple the voltage from a microcontroller with capacitors and diodes (though I've been getting some weird results )... I've done a basic hookup with a motor and a switch where I've switch the polarity to reverse the direction of the spin (though my op amps and transistors are still in the mail so I haven't been able to do too much so far)...

I would like to build my own motor driver circuit if you could give a few pointers on that, I already have a microcontroller so I'm not sure why I would need to use a separate module since my microcontroller already has PWM and DAC pins...

[JacobEdward]

In 3 years, not one part has failed me.

I actually had the first LED I pulled out of a pack of 100 be a dud (the next LED worked) lol

[WattsUp]

Sorry, i found the abbreviations confusing at first as well.
74xx is a type of logic chip. You will usually see something like 74hc595 (shift register), where the hc is the type (high speed CMOS? Can't remember tbh) and the 595 is the actual part. Often you will see the same number with different letters like LS.
BJT is a bipolar junction transistor, AKA a normal NPN or PNP transistor
SMD stands for Surface Mount Device
THT is Through Hole Technology (I should have put THD for continuity but that also stands for something else so I never use it
And BTW stands for by the way!

On your motor driver question, the reason you will normally have an external driver (often a H bridge) is because your micro can't provide enough current through its input/output pins. The motor driver will probably just be some MOSFETS that switch the heavy currents (think of them like relays for this instance).
Ben

[WattsUp]

If you google phrases like "Transistor Logic Gates" or "Transistor Computer/Adder" you'll find some decent results. Unfortunately, I can't remember the website I found but I'll look for you. Something you should definitely look at are 555 timer circuits. If you understand the basics, you will be amazed at what you can do with them. Dave used one to mod his Mantis to have an adjustable light.

  About eBay, I understand it can be a lottery, but for people like me who can't afford, or just don't have the option, to use vendors like Digikey, it's a necessary evil. Unfortunately, I am in a position where regular orders are not possible, so I have to buy big packs of parts and hope they will be OK for a future project.
Ben

EDIT: I found this site useful, but Google around and see what works for you - http://www.waitingforfriday.com/index.php/4-Bit_Computer

[Simon]

  From what I've seen on the forum, there is a general consensus that components on eBay are all bad and doomed to fail. I for one always buy from eBay, as it's the only way I can get stuff. In 3 years, not one part has failed me. I actually think i have bought an ATmega kit thing from you (with crystal, caps and socket?).

There is the legitimate question of provenance on ebay. For hobby stuff it's generally good enough and I've had plenty of companies buy from me on ebay with no complaints. my ATmega328 chips come from main wholesale dealers in the Uk or europe, I just buy in big enough quantities to get the price down to sell on for a reasonable price. If an ATMega328 is being sold cheaply and it sounds too good to be true then it is. Chinese suppliers either won't supply them or stop answering emails when i ask if they are genuine.

[JacobEdward]

I would have thought a Op Amp would be the solution to a mircocontroller not being able to supply enough Voltage or Current and use transistors to create the H-bridge...

While looking into motors, it seems that I'll need more flexibility with frequency than what my microcontroller can give, is there an easy solution to this?  The core chip on my microcontroller is about $5 and without any of the special code it can output 72 MHtz (it can barely give 5KHtz as it is right now) so I'm not entirely sure why I would need to spend hundreds of dollars on a variable frequency drive to control AC motors...

[Simon]

I would have thought a Op Amp would be the solution to a mircocontroller not being able to supply enough Voltage or Current and use transistors to create the H-bridge...

While looking into motors, it seems that I'll need more flexibility with frequency than what my microcontroller can give, is there an easy solution to this?  The core chip on my microcontroller is about $5 and without any of the special code it can output 72 MHtz (it can barely give 5KHtz as it is right now) so I'm not entirely sure why I would need to spend hundreds of dollars on a variable frequency drive to control AC motors...

Completely confused there, what micro controller are you using and what are you trying to achieve ?