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Reapproaching learning electronics

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scatterandfocus:
A little background:  I have always been fascinated with electronics, and I would like to reapproach learning it.  Years ago I had some electronics classes which turned out to be a bad move.  The dc class was 99% book work, 1% hand-ons practical stuff.  What was taught in that class could have been covered in a few weeks max, but it was instead spread out over a semester with alot of pointless busy work.  The most complicated hands-on exercise that ever took place in that class was checking voltage and current over a potentiometer.  At the same time, I had a soldering class, and the instructor covered dc in less than a week for students who had no dc background.  He did it better in that week than the instructor of my dc class in a full semester.  In my digital fundamentals class, the instructor was a first-timer and had no idea how to approach teaching, which she repeatedly expressed to the class, continuously apologizing for how bad it was going and eventually bumping up ever student's final grade to at least a pass level so as not to run into trouble.  I at least walked away from that class with a general overview of the subject, but very little in way of doing anything practical with any of it.  The ac class was pretty much the opposite.  We jumped right away into connecting things on a breadboard without theory/understanding of what we were doing.  Toward the very end of my run with those classes, the instructor of the dc class told me that EVERY student from the last run of the electronics tech program failed exit exams and that the director and instructors were still trying to figure out what to do about it.  I at least walked away from it all with a taste for electronics but with some debt to pay off in the end.  I felt like I got ripped off by that school with no recourse.  Bahhh.  But that is all in the past.

Some things that came to mind as I was attending classes were that we should have been working with components and tools from the very beginning (integrating hands-on with theory), building simple circuits and working them up to more complicated circuits, doing some experimentation, troubleshooting problems along the way, keeping notebooks, letting some smoke out (my dc instructor complained when I let the smoke out of a potentiometer, which was one a very few times that we actually worked with components, to which I replied that learning requires making mistakes and learning from them).  There wasn't time made for this type of stuff in the classes that I attended.  And there also should have been some integration of fundamental math for electronics.  At the least, a math for electronics survey type course.  The closest that we got to anything like that was a miserable attempt by the dc instructor to cover some trig basics over a single class period.  There was no math requirement for the electronics program, which seems farcical.

So then, since there are no other schools in my area, I'm thinking of reapproaching learning electronics independently.  I think that I should do it in a sort of layered approach.  Start back at basics, with something like a short hobby type book that covers a broad range of basics without going too deep (a sort of hands-on overview approach), along with acquiring some components and basic tools for building circuits and experimenting along the way.  Later, I would maybe pick up some textbooks (although I tend to despise reading textbooks), and go deeper into individual topics.  But where I'm lost is approaching learning the math side of things.  Alot of people say that electronics is applied math, but are there books or other resources which teach math in that way?  In other words, not just math as an individual study in itself, but rather, math as applied to practical electronics.   Or arriving at the math as needed through circuit requirements.  And by 'math' I mean from fundamental algebra on up.  I would eventually like to get to the point of working with a book such as 'The Art of Electronics', which I have an old copy of (the book and workbook).  How could I work up to that via an integrated hands-on/theory/math approach?  Can it be done without wading years through multiple 1,200 page tombs?  I find that working with textbooks (whatever the topic of study) tends to extinguish enthusiam in the subject at hand.  Does anyone produce a series of smaller approachable books for electronics?

xyrtek:
Before I finished reading your post I though about suggesting "The art of electronics" and the eevblog, it seems you have both covered, get going.

In 3 words, stop being "scatter(ed) and focus" :)

rstofer:
There's more taught in the DC circuits than just simple circuits.  The real topics are Ohm's Law, Kirchoff's Law, Thevenin's Theorem, matrix algebra, solution of simultaneous linear equation (mesh and node equations from Kirchoff's Law), perhaps time domain response of RC, RL and RLC circuits - at least the charging/discharging equations and, I suspect, some topics I have overlooked.  The physical construction of resistors, capacitors and inductors is also covered.

The math required for this program is not too high.  Algebra ought to do it and even that is fairly minimal.  But do expect to solve simultaneous linear equations.

Every bit of the math required is available in video tutorial form at Khan Academy.  Download and learn to use LTspice for circuit analysis.  I would highly recommend installing and using MATLAB but it costs a lot of money (relatively) and the alternative is Octave but I don't see any books for Electronics with Octave.  Octave is purported to be a very close clone of MATLAB and here is a MATLAB book

http://www.ee.hacettepe.edu.tr/~solen/Matlab/MatLab/Matlab%20-%20Electronics%20and%20Circuit%20Analysis%20using%20Matlab.pdf

Maybe the tutorials at Digilent will help:

https://learn.digilentinc.com/classroom/realanalog/

There are tutorials all over the Internet.  Some may actually follow a rational progression from beginning up through some level.  Others seem to wander all over the place.

I don't see a good reason for not just starting with "Art of Electronics" and "Learning the Art of Electronics".  They seem to be a standard approach although I can't say I have spent much time with them.  Maybe because I already took the classes, albeit a long time ago, and I'm not struggling with theory.

FWIW, here is the first in a series of videos re: solving simultaneous equations:

https://www.khanacademy.org/math/algebra-home/alg-system-of-equations/alg-equivalent-systems-of-equations/v/solving-systems-of-equations-by-elimination

Unfortunately, math is usually taught as math, for math majors, by math professors.  The University of Florida purportedly has two tracks:  Math for math majors and math for others (engineers, etc).  Kudos if this is true.

Yes, electronics IS applied math and, basically, it's all math.  You can't even get started without some sense of numbers.  But for the first semester, Algebra should be enough and not even hard Algebra.

How much math you need is determined by how far you want to get.  Mostly hobbyists get by with some limited version of Algebra.  Engineers will take math every semester for five years of undergrad and more when they get to grad school.  Engineering really is all math!

A good scientific calculator will be required.  I use an older HP48GX but I also have the TI Inspire and the HP50 graphing calculators with CAS (Computer Algebra System).  Note that there are limitations on calculator selection for various qualification exams (ACT, SAT, etc).  I use MATLAB at every opportunity - even for fairly trivial problems.

rstofer:
Watch lots of videos!  EEVblog theory videos and most of w2aew's videos cover the material without getting terribly bogged down in math.

Watch the EEVblog OpAmps Tutorial video:



There's a lot of circuit theory going on.  Note the use of Kirchoff's Current Law (KCL) then go over to the Digilent site and watch their discussion on mesh and nodal analysis.

Any of the EEVblog Fundamentals Friday videos should be useful.

Johnboy:

--- Quote from: scatterandfocus on December 29, 2018, 07:58:37 pm ---Start back at basics, with something like a short hobby type book that covers a broad range of basics without going too deep (a sort of hands-on overview approach), along with acquiring some components and basic tools for building circuits and experimenting along the way.  Later, I would maybe pick up some textbooks (although I tend to despise reading textbooks), and go deeper into individual topics.  But where I'm lost is approaching learning the math side of things.  Alot of people say that electronics is applied math, but are there books or other resources which teach math in that way?  In other words, not just math as an individual study in itself, but rather, math as applied to practical electronics.   Or arriving at the math as needed through circuit requirements.  And by 'math' I mean from fundamental algebra on up...

...Does anyone produce a series of smaller approachable books for electronics?

--- End quote ---

Considering your above-quoted requirements (particularly "fundamental algebra on up"), I'd humbly suggest taking a look at the current edition of Charles Platt's "Make: Electronics" book as a starting point. The book's math rarely hints above high-school level algebra, while the focus is on simple hands-on projects, including a few opportunities to deliberately let the smoke out of components.

There are some pre-compiled component kits available for sale to use with the specific experiments outlined in the book. They are not inexpensive, but they are a quick way to get started. However, there is a tradeoff for assembling your own components for the book, and this is getting into the habit of examining component datasheets for suitability as well as comparing prices, availability, and shipping times from various suppliers for the components you'll need for future projects on your own.

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