How do you organize all your components?

[cvriv]

I bought 8 of these bins, made by Ackro-Mils, that each have 64 drawers. After getting most of components I have in these bins, I come to realize that I really need to think about this, because the little drawers are being used up quick.

My question is... how do you organize your stuff? So many different components and values for each component. How you you organize your resistors? Capacitors? Etc. This is really frustrating me. LOL.

 

[tautech]

SMD passives in those binder books.
TH passives in trays and clear lidded multi compartment boxes.
A few drawered units for active devices with ESD sensitive ones on/in ESD foam. (those not bagged or tubed)

TH resistors can be sorted to have 2 values/compartment, Eg, 1-9.1 can share the same as 10-91 . Likewise with many of the other decades that don't get used much. Another: 1-9.1M can share with 10M up.
In this way all my standard value resistors are in 5 stackable trays with 32 compartments/tray with 1-9.1, 10-100, 1M-9.1M and 10M up all in one tray.
I got this setup from a deceased estate years ago and was hesitant about it at first but once used to it, it works surprisingly well. 

[Back2Volts]

Me to, for a year or so, I have been overwhelmed and struggling trying to figure out what direction to take, but it appears my problem is an order of magnitude smaller that yours because I just have two of the large Ackro-Mils frames with a mix of single and double wide drawers.   (Most of the stuff is piled up somewhere else)

I am, finally, starting to get a hand on it.   Just a coincidence, Today I finished some EXCEL VBA code to print labels and proceeded to organize all transistors, repacked, relabeled, in two double drawers, for MOSFETs and  BJTs.   I plan to work on diodes tomorrow.   

You should take a look at the sticky thread, which is where I will post some details about what I have been doing, may be in a couple of days.   

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/beginners/from-no-parts-to-decent-stockpile-best-approach/

[cvriv]

Good advice. I have two values per tray now with the resistors and capacitors that I have now, well not all the caps. I have these smalls redish ceramic caps I dont know what to do with. I dont know the voltage rating for them so I dont want to mix them with the others I have , because I have have to the others listed with a voltage rating. I like the decade idea though.

[SingedFingers]

They stay in the bags they came in and get chucked in a box. Apathy reigns here.

[HackedFridgeMagnet]

goto surface mount and buy 1 book for caps and one for resistors 

edit:oops already suggested.

[Ian.M]

I've tried both methods - individual location for each value (e.g. 1/8W leaded resistors in sample tubes, in a box) and decade multipliers of the same base value stored together (e.g. bandoleered resistors in compartmented hobby boxes).   I reckon it takes longer to locate the right part from the individual tubes due to the number of possible locations than it does to pick through the few loose parts at the bottom of each shared compartment for the third band you want.   There usually aren't many to choose from as only good condition parts from solderless breadboarding get put back in the original compartment, and the new stock is still on bandoleer tape, which I carefully label with the value, and whenever possible keep in order within the conpartment.

However resistors and other clearly colour coded parts are a special case as a trained eye can 'pattern search' for the desired third band colour ignoring the identical first two bands so you can pick out parts as fast as you can grab them with tweezers.

If you are mixing values with text labelled parts like capacitors, make sure they are physically distinct.  e..g. there is little risk of confusing 1uF capacitors with 1000uF ones.

Whatever you do, wall mounted storage is a PITA unless you are operating a proper stockroom to serve a number of users, and work from a picking list into a portable tray or other container per user.   For a single user (or even a couple of users at adjacent benches), compartmented hobby boxes, or SMD binders etc. that can be taken to one's bench to pick from as you need them are far more convenient, even if there's a fair bit of "Hey Joe, have you still got the SOT-23 NPNs?" going on, as long as, if there's more than one user, the rule is: If you leave your bench for any reason, all parts boxes etc, must go back to their proper shelf.

[razberik]

Does it take longer to organise your components than it does to search for the one you need when you need it?

Exactly.
Having some stockpile of resistors/capacitors + basic semiconductors like few types of diodes, NPN, PNP, NMOS, PMOS.

Years ago I used to desolder components from boards, clean their pins and assort them. I abandoned this approach. I collect whole boards with no touch, I put sticker on them with number and then I write to XLS a number of the board and what exactly interesting is there. Like "two TPSxxx converters", "lot of 74HCxxx", "FTDI chip".

[KL27x]

Trash can. I use it more and more. It works, everytime. My memory doesn't.

[JacquesBBB]

My basic storage unit  is small ziplock bags. Its a very effective storage.

Then I put several bags in  plastics boxes or drawers, with some coherence.

Then the most important is to  have the description of everything on a database accessible from everywhere.
For this, I use a simple google sheet. I do not keep track of the numbers of items.
I put the initial number only, and eventually some update if this is really needed.

All my parts are not in this database, but I put a label on the boxes that have been  indexed, and then try to keep them indexed.  It takes a little time to index the parts, but I  use digikey.com to get the main features of the parts, and
then it saves a lot of time when searching for something.

I had only a few indexed at the beginning, but my tendency is to complete   the indexing as time goes,  because it is so efficient then to search for something.

With a google sheet, I can access this database from anywhere, on my computers, phone, ipads.

[SingedFingers]

ziplock bags FTW. I managed to get my entire box of cack (RS standard size) reduced to a single large ziplock. Less is more - this is my entire parts inventory:



I intend to chuck anything left in a sweepings box and eBay it. Looking at the price of boxes of cack on there, it may be an efficient way of keeping stock low and therefore avoiding inventory, storage and all that sort of stuff.

[jpanhalt]

Several good methods have been mentioned for passives.   I use some version of partitioned boxes and/or sleeves for them.
 
When I got back into the hobby 20 years ago, most active devices I used were TH or were SMD with labels, and I also used a version of boxes with a paper sheet showing the approximate location of each.  Each class had a box, e.g., op-amps, voltage regulators, comparators, logic, and so forth.  As parts got smaller and labels disappeared, I saved them in their shipping zip packs.  Unfortunately, those packages can take a lot of space for a few components.  A few years ago, I started making my own sleeves.  That started with getting a large roll of anti-static sleeving off eBay cheaply.   It is 2" wide when flat.  I now make smaller packets with a impulse sealer.

I cut out the label from the distributor's package and insert that along with labeling the packet.   I actually do not like ziplock bags for this type of storage, particularly when they are small, and I need to access several times.  They get increasingly difficult to open when you have dry skin.   What I do is put a single staple in the corner of my packet.  That holds the flap effectively closed, but allows access to the parts with a pair of forceps.   For some bags, I just fold over and don't bother with the staple.  The bags are then stored in a plastic box.   Several different bags can be stored in a single divided space.  Also, miniature cloths pins (Walmart) can be helpful.

John     

PS: How do you insert images to appear in the body of a post?

[Ian.M]

Consider the cost of storage.  e.g. office space in New York was about $150/ft²/Y in 2015.  Assume a 7.5ft high shelving unit, and that's $20/ft³/Y or slightly under 1.2 cents a year for 1 in³.

I'm assuming that it takes a minimum of 1 in³ to keep small parts in a labelled ziploc bag in a reasonably easy to access fashion.

Then there's the cost of retrieving it vs reordering it -  What's your hourly wage?  double it for overheads then its a matter of comparing the total cost to order it *INCLUDING* the time spent wrestling with the supplier's website, and the time wasted putting the project aside, and getting it out again and reviewing where you've got to, and the time spent receiving unpacking and checking the order, with the cost of the couple of minutes to rummage for it in your storage.

Even if you actually account for all your storage and access costs, its cost-effective to have a moderate small parts inventory - stuff that you are certain you will need within the next five years.  The problems start when you've got too much stuff to have a good idea whether or not you've got a particular part and where to look for it without having to maintain an inventory database.  You cant enter 1 cent resistors in a database fast enough to make it worth doing unless you simply estimate quantity remaining on a reel.

[RoGeorge]

It all depends: how much space/parts/time/money do you have, and are you doing it for commercial or hobby purposes?
Here are some DIY ideas https://hackaday.io/project/6261-new-a-free-lab-organizer

The small drawers cabinets, like in the last image from the link, apart from being the most expensive was also the worst of all in my experience. The best method, for both easy of access and compactness, was the one with the envelopes cut in half but is suitable for TH resistors only.
Lately, I am using mostly zip-lock bags and 4 sizes of transparent plastic storage boxes with transparent leads too.

[elimenohpee]

ziplock bags FTW. I managed to get my entire box of cack (RS standard size) reduced to a single large ziplock. Less is more - this is my entire parts inventory:



I intend to chuck anything left in a sweepings box and eBay it. Looking at the price of boxes of cack on there, it may be an efficient way of keeping stock low and therefore avoiding inventory, storage and all that sort of stuff.

I use a similar approach, and put all the ziplock bags in one storage bin with other random electronics related items that I don't want laying on the bench. 

[vodka]

ziplock bags FTW. I managed to get my entire box of cack (RS standard size) reduced to a single large ziplock. Less is more - this is my entire parts inventory:



I intend to chuck anything left in a sweepings box and eBay it. Looking at the price of boxes of cack on there, it may be an efficient way of keeping stock low and therefore avoiding inventory, storage and all that sort of stuff.

I use a similar approach, and put all the ziplock bags in one storage bin with other random electronics related items that I don't want laying on the bench. 

I used this method .I put the components on  paper bags(diy) or plastic bags  i stored on pacermaker boxes . But it arrived one moment that the bags into boxes became to chaos for searching the components.
So i changed almost componets of  the boxes by three medium organiziers. It has to say : Most comfortable and more easy to find the components

[Avacee]

Compartment boxes for all TH, IC's, switches, buttons, leds, small circuit board stuff, etc.  Glue'd some of the removable dividers down so stuff can't get mixed up.

650ml Chinese takeaway cartons for the next size up items - 1 Box of 100 cartons cost £8 (~$11). They are strong, have tight snap-on lids, are see-through and stack well - and also stack inside each other when not in use!
These have been my buy of the century for sorting out items. Sure, there's a fair amount of air stored on my shelves when a box only has a small item in but I can find everything really quickly (and that's what I value).

Really Useful Boxes for anything larger. Clear, strong, quality lids and again, they stack well.
Zip-Lock bags - these are stored in a really useful box.

[tautech]

Another little bench goody are the small alloy pet food containers, washed of course. 

I've got a good stack of them that are invaluable for putting componentry, screws and knick knacks in while working on a project.

[danmcb]

+++ for ziplocks. IKEA do these boxes a bit smaller than a shoe box, just buy components from Farnell and file them in there.

BTW ordering 20 off every 0805 resistor in E24 from 10R to 10M is like 6€, where a pre-bought kit is about 120€. You just have to spend an hour or two organising them. The kitting people at Farnell  must hate me though ...

[SingedFingers]

Talking of Ikea, these are very good quality stacking boxes for parts. I keep batteries in a couple. I did consider sorting all parts into them but apathy took over. We have them dotted around all over the place:

http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/products/childrens-ikea-products/children-3-7/small-storage/glis-box-with-lid-white-light-green-blue-art-80098583/

[suicidaleggroll]

When I'm doing a project, I buy all of the components needed for that project plus a few spares, complete the project, throw all leftovers in a ziplock with the project name written on it, and put it in a drawer.

I don't keep track of individual components.  It takes too much effort for too little payoff.  My time is worth far more to me than spending even a few minutes hunting down a $0.01 resistor from a large parts bin, and my projects are diverse enough that I would need a LARGE parts bin to keep all of the individual components separate.

I do have a small selection of through hole parts for breadboarding, but anything specialized gets purchased for, and devoted to, a single project.

[Back2Volts]

After a year of struggling on how to organize my components I have finally figured out my solution and I am mostly done implementing it.    I used to keep the parts in the bags as they shipped, and felt it was messy and it was a pain rumaging through the retailer bags to find something that could fit the need.   I knew I had stuff, but was hard to find and even harder to figure out what would be the best part choice out of what I had.

At some point, I got a couple of Akro-mils organizers, with a mix of small and double size drawers and started to place stuff on them.   It worked well for a lot of the eBay purchased items, like headers, small mechanical parts...   but it became obvious it would not solve the retailers (Mouser, e14..) bags problem without re-bagging.

I also gave a try to test tubes, but soon decided they were not the thing for me.   On the other hand, I have found the Chinese "Sample" handbooks to be a good solution for SMD resistors.

For the low cost TH resistor sets, 1/8W and 1/4W, I started organizing each decade to a drawer, but they where taking 12 mostly empty double drawers and moved to place three decades per drawer.   Keeping them ordered by value makes it easy to access the desired (or closest) value.   

I got to the conclusion that I needed to keep some kind of inventory record and decided EXCEL was the simplest solution.    Getting down to it, I created one worksheet for main component types (diodes, transistors, capacitors...) with columns like part number(w/datasheet hyperlink), package, voltage, current, power, unit cost, etc...   I included my own 4-char SKU column.   I loaded the parts from the vendor invoices.

With that done, I was confronted with printing labels from the worksheets.   I took my wife's Brother label printer (P-Touch PT-2730) .   I downloaded the P-Touch software from Brother, trying to print directly from EXCEL worksheets.  Then I found that the existing plugin for EXCEL does not work on 64bits.   I resolved to write a VBA macro to generate formatted CSV from the worksheets.    It allows me to print different label formats by component class.   

I did not include the cheap TH resistor sets in the inventory.   I decided "file-cabinet_search" was good enough.
 
With the process mostly completed, I find it very convenient to browse the EXCEL for parts, access datasheets for research and locate parts easily.

The pictures (here and next post) show how it looks.
 



 
 
   

[Back2Volts]

Some more pics

[tautech]

I have found the Chinese "Sample" handbooks to be a good solution for SMD resistors.

And anything else SMD on thin tape, caps, LEDs, your favourite SOT-23 X etc.

[Back2Volts]

I have found the Chinese "Sample" handbooks to be a good solution for SMD resistors.

And anything else SMD on thin tape, caps, LEDs, your favourite SOT-23 X etc.

I agree, and I may do that for capacitors if I get a bunch of values in SMD.    For now, since I do not have that much in those categories, it makes more sense to me to mix them with the non-SMDs counterparts.