Learning more, finding inspiration

[Moriambar]

Hi,
(long post, tldr in bold)
albeit I know I will never be a professional in EE, I'd like to find some new circuits to practice and design: I try and use every single moment in my wake time (not working) trying to learn but with little result.
I mean, my goal is to understand (maybe one day design) circuits like the ones in this post or this post or even more complex, and try and learn professional practices.
Ofc i'm a hobbyist and it'll take a long time and effort. Time and effort I'm willing to spend.

Currently I have the Art of Electronics, I've read it and tried to understand it all, the problem is that unless I know what to search for, it is hard to learn (for me) from it: I think it's because it's not a circuit I have to design, fail and correct so that I don't learn much. Or perhaps I don't fully make the tools mine. Maybe it's because I don't like ham radio so I don't find the need for hard circuits?


So what I ask you is a book, a resource that can make me improve in designing, understanding more complex circuits than "mcu+fet" or "npn current sink", perhaps with many examples and circuit to design.

I don't want mcus: those I understand sufficiently, I guess, it's the other stuff...


Sorry for the long post I hope you can help me.

Cheers

[armandine2]

..I can sense you're keen to get better outcomes in your studies. Many will have similar frustrations 

I don't think we are always well served by the learning materials out there - occasionally you find something you think worth sharing:

[Benta]

AoE is an exceptionally good book, especially if you've already been doing electronic engineering for 10+ years. A beginner will drown.

A good place to start is the Don Lancaster series of "cookbooks". Fortunately, they are free to download today. I don't concur with everything in them, but it's by far the most comprehensive set of entry-level books I know of.
Here's the link:
https://www.tinaja.com/ebksamp1.shtml#freeeb

Cheers.

[rstofer]

You might find something helpful in any of the Forrest Mims books - search Amazon for 'Forrest Mims books'.

[Moriambar]

Thanks to all, I'm trying and use all of your resources:
bookmarked the video, the free ebooks page (and started the one on cmos) and bought one forrest mims book.
Keep it coming

[gjvdheiden]

W2AEW's youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/@w2aew  especially the playlists "Bipolar Transistor Videos", "Circuit Tutorials" and "Op Amp Tutorials".

[EEVblog]

So what I ask you is a book, a resource that can make me improve in designing, understanding more complex circuits than "mcu+fet" or "npn current sink", perhaps with many examples and circuit to design.

The Art of Electronics, which also has a student manual.

[EEVblog]

Anything by Colin Mitchell:
https://www.talkingelectronics.com/
Old school convoluted website, but everything is free.

[Moriambar]

Anything by Colin Mitchell:
https://www.talkingelectronics.com/
Old school convoluted website, but everything is free.

Thanks for the suggestion, but the website is dead my internet was acting up

W2AEW's youtube channel w2aew[/member]]https://www.youtube.com/@w2aew  especially the playlists "Bipolar Transistor Videos", "Circuit Tutorials" and "Op Amp Tutorials".

thanks

So what I ask you is a book, a resource that can make me improve in designing, understanding more complex circuits than "mcu+fet" or "npn current sink", perhaps with many examples and circuit to design.

The Art of Electronics, which also has a student manual.

I have it but I almost never see a circuit and say "hey, that's what I'd use that for" or "that's what this is doing"... I'l try the student manual


thanks

[fourfathom]

These are all good suggestions.  I learned a lot from the "ARRL Handbook for Radio Communications", which has the basic fundamentals, and then lots of applications that use those fundamentals.  The Handbook gets updated every few years, but even one from the 1960's can get you started (obviously no new-fangled integrated circuit stuff in that one!)

You definitely want to learn the "bottom-up" basics, but one thing that helps me learn is to have a project I want to do or a problem that I need to solve.  I probably don't already know everything necessary to complete the task, and this provides me with some "top-down" motivation, that guides my learning process.  The field of electronics is *so* huge that without some task to focus your efforts it's easy to just flounder.  Plus, finishing (or even just starting) a task will give you a sense of accomplishment, and we all need some positive feedback from time to time.

[Moriambar]

These are all good suggestions.  I learned a lot from the "ARRL Handbook for Radio Communications", which has the basic fundamentals, and then lots of applications that use those fundamentals.  The Handbook gets updated every few years, but even one from the 1960's can get you started (obviously no new-fangled integrated circuit stuff in that one!)

You definitely want to learn the "bottom-up" basics, but one thing that helps me learn is to have a project I want to do or a problem that I need to solve.  I probably don't already know everything necessary to complete the task, and this provides me with some "top-down" motivation, that guides my learning process.  The field of electronics is *so* huge that without some task to focus your efforts it's easy to just flounder.  Plus, finishing (or even just starting) a task will give you a sense of accomplishment, and we all need some positive feedback from time to time.

thanks this is insightful. The ARRL books are quite "expensive" used, like at least 30€ including shipping. Are they worth it?

By the way what I'm searching for is problems that can make me learn… I mean can you believe that I never even used an op-amp or comparator in any of my designs?

Anyhow thanks

[rstofer]

Dave has op amp tutorials as does w2aew. like this:



Most op amp experiments can be done using two 9V batteries if you don't have a +-15V dual output power supply.

The op amp was invented for analog computng and this is still my area of interest.  Audio and RF don't really hold any interest for me.

I built a clone of Dr Vogel's small analog computer.  I also grabbed a couple of Comdyna GP6 computers from eBay

https://t-lcarchive.org/comdyna-gp-6/

[Moriambar]

thanks. I find op amps theory easy to understand, meaning the classic basic circuits.
Then you look around and bam you see impossible feedback networks and stuff and I don't know where to begin…
I mean, it's like I'm really missing the tools. I'll have to try and find the need for using an opamp. I think from there I'll gather a bit of practice.
Thanks @rstofer for your post

[djsb]

https://www.ibiblio.org/kuphaldt/electricCircuits/

There are also a few books by Lorne McDonald available on kindle that go into GREAT detail on circuit analysis.

[rstofer]

I mean, it's like I'm really missing the tools. I'll have to try and find the need for using an opamp. I think from there I'll gather a bit of practice.
Thanks @rstofer for your post

Just breadboard the standard circuits:  inverting amplifier (experiment with gain), non-inverting amplifier (again, experiment with gain), 3 input inverting summer, active low pass filter, active high pass filter and, finally, my favorite, the inverting integrator (for 1 second integration, use 1 ufd and 1 Mohm.  Experiment with integrating a square wave to get a triangle.

There are a lot of videos like: