Interesting [cheap] DIY kits from Ebay for beginners?

[kalel]

Hi there,

If you know a DIY kit from eBay, or another website that sells Chinese goods, which you personally find interesting and that might be suitable for beginners, feel free to post about it.

There's no better way to practice than do some soldering, but that works even better if the result is interesting.

[cdev]

There are an incredibly large number of interesting kits. (And they come from all around the world, not any one country/area)

There are also an extremely wide range of skill levels, interests, and target kit builders..
It would be a great category for this blog, I think to have a kit section, so people who wanted to build something could have a one stop shop for suggestions.

 Just about any person is likely to have more specific interests. Even rank beginners like children. I know I did when I was a kid. Electronics is a very broad subject domain.

[kalel]

There are an incredibly large number of interesting kits. (And they come from all around the world, not any one country/area)

There are also an extremely wide range of skill levels, interests, and target kit builders..
It would be a great category for this blog, I think to have a kit section, so people who wanted to build something could have a one stop shop for suggestions.

 Just about any person is likely to have more specific interests. Even rank beginners like children. I know I did when I was a kid. Electronics is a very broad subject domain.

Good idea. Focusing on beginners (although there are various definitions), I mentioned cheap kits, they don't necessarily have to come from China of course, but they usually might. And as a lot of people here probably had some experiences with kits already, they might be able to provide interesting recommendations and experiences. Low cost helps make things a bit easier to swallow when something fails, and gives a better incentive to try, and when needed, try again.

[skarecrow]

This thread is a great idea. Definitely need to make mention of whether the kits come with good (or ANY) instructions. I recently built a DIY clock kit I got for like $1.46 shipped that came with just a parts list. Luckily the board was silkscreened so I knew where everything went, but someone with no experience would be totally lost.

Also please rate kit quality. Are the components decent brand/quality? Or did they break in half or catch on fire when you looked at them too hard? Did everything work correctly the first time? My clock sorta worked. All my number 1s look like backwards letter Ls. Could be my fault, but I doubt it.

I think someone else mentioned it, but reccomended skill level would be great too.

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[rstofer]

Spend some time at: https://www.adafruit.com/
Their stuff tends to be at a higher functional level.

It does no good to ask about DIY kits without even specifying an area of interest.  Op amps?  Analog computing (my favorite use of op amps)?  Toys built from Arduino (see Adafruit above)?  Transistor circuits?  Radio?  Ham Radio?  FPGAs?

How about https://www.sparkfun.com/

[xrunner]

Hi there,

If you know a DIY kit from eBay, or another website that sells Chinese goods, which you personally find interesting and that might be suitable for beginners, feel free to post about it.

There's no better way to practice than do some soldering, but that works even better if the result is interesting.

We had a thread about these a while back - if you want to learn or practice surface mount soldering there are kits available. They don't do much when finished but that's not the point of them. For example it might flash an LED but it won't flash it unless all the SMD components have been soldered properly. Just an idea.

SMD Practice Kit

[stj]

Hi there,

If you know a DIY kit from eBay, or another website that sells Chinese goods, which you personally find interesting and that might be suitable for beginners, feel free to post about it.

There's no better way to practice than do some soldering, but that works even better if the result is interesting.

We had a thread about these a while back - if you want to learn or practice surface mount soldering there are kits available. They don't do much when finished but that's not the point of them. For example it might flash an LED but it won't flash it unless all the SMD components have been soldered properly. Just an idea.

are you the seller?
you linked a $13 kit that costs $3 from china!!
http://www.ebay.com/itm/DIY-SMD-Rotating-LED-Components-Soldering-Practice-Board-Skill-Training-DIY-Kits/401251051609

[skarecrow]

This thread is a great idea. Definitely need to make mention of whether the kits come with good (or ANY) instructions. I recently built a DIY clock kit I got for like $1.46 shipped that came with just a parts list. Luckily the board was silkscreened so I knew where everything went, but someone with no experience would be totally lost.

Also please rate kit quality. Are the components decent brand/quality? Or did they break in half or catch on fire when you looked at them too hard?

For $1.46 (shipped?) I hope you're not asking too much.

I don't remember the exact price, but I'm pretty sure it was under $2 shipped from China. Attached is a picture that SHOULD read 07:14.

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[xrunner]

are you the seller?

No.

you linked a $13 kit that costs $3 from china!!
http://www.ebay.com/itm/DIY-SMD-Rotating-LED-Components-Soldering-Practice-Board-Skill-Training-DIY-Kits/401251051609

Remain calm - It's simply meant as an example. 

[cdev]

I built a capacitance meter ket from jyetech that costs around $8 from seedstudio. It took around an hour and a half and the kit is based on an AVR chip. It had fairly good description of how it worked, and the kit also could be connected to anUSB to UART chip if you want digital output. Its very easy to use and until I got my AVR Transistor tester and UT61E around three years ago was my only means of measuring capacitance. Its got precision resistors and is just as accurate, even on very low capacitances and the newer tools, even down to just a few PF. Its as accurate (or inaccurate, since they all agree with one another)  as my AVR Transistor tester and UT61E. Which is to say its likely a quality device which retains its usefulness. And for $8 its hard to beat.

The instructions also came with info about how you could use the socketed AVR PCB to program other AVRs. I got the impression that JyETech was committed to education. I wouldnt feel bad about recommending any of their kits. They seemed to "get it" that electronics is more about being inventive than anything else.

[RGB255_0_0]

I'd stay away from many of the Chinese kits unless you don't care for documentation regarding programming them. They will link you to the software and it's all in Chinese. For instance https://m.banggood.com/DIY-Spherical-Rotating-LED-Kit-POV-Soldering-Training-Kit-p-1050086.html

I would not recommend that to a beginner due to awkwardness in soldering the LEDs. Anyway, I haven't seen anyone work out how to customise them yet, but I can flash the examples they have given.

If you want a nice, useful project, get an LCR ESR DIY kit.

[stj]

that actually looks really good, but as you say - not for a beginner.
too bad it's not RGB leds.

[daflory]

You can find a lot of Elenco kits on ebay. They have the best instructions (you won't get that from China) and are pretty reasonably priced. Their transistor radio kits are great for beginners because the manual breaks out the sections, explains their operation, and has full testing and alignment instructions.

[P90]

the kkmoon mega328 avr transistor component tester kit from ebay is good for under $15