Solderless vs. soldering - what a difference (measuring 3V LDO)

[AlienRelics]

My best breadboards are from about 1980 from Radio Shack. They were the original manufacturer, rebranded with Radio Shack's name. Rather thick gold plated contacts.

I've had good and bad since then, some really bad. None are meant for much current, tend to have higher resistance than soldered, and are not good for higher frequencies.

Something anyone starting out in electronics should be told but rarely are.

[Peabody]

Yes, Ben Eater's board is the one I use.  Also available at Amazon, Digkey, Mouser.  Busboard Prototype Systems.

[joeqsmith]

My best breadboards are from about 1980 from Radio Shack.  ...
I've had good and bad since then, some really bad. None are meant for much current, tend to have higher resistance than soldered, and are not good for higher frequencies.   ...

I would imagine mine are all from that era as well.  No idea on the brand.  I still use them for quick and dirty tests.     

For resistance I swept the current through a bus using two copper wires from 30 to 1200mA while measuring the voltage drop.   Resistance stayed around 0.15 ohms.    I then tried four other bus bars at random using 1200mA and measured from 0.08 to 0.18 ohms.  I have no idea how that compares with other boards but certainly easy enough to anyone to check theirs.  With the age and high use of mine, I wouldn't be surprised to find most are much better.   

Heat wise, the worse case was 37uW.  I've pushed more current than 1.2Amps through them before without a problem.  Like others, I would have liked to have seen OPs construction before trying to offer any advice.   

As for higher frequencies, the one link I provided where I was testing inductors, I was testing in excess of 10MHz.  The parasitics became a problem and I had to float one of the nodes.  Still it was very functional.  Of course, if 10MHz isn't what you consider higher frequencies, there's always that second link where I demonstrated an oscillator running in excess of 25GHz. 

From 2021, I mention my use of 3M.  As I said, same old same old. 
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/beginners/are-all-breadboards-equal-or-are-there-good-and-bad-ones/

[tooki]

Too much hassle when there are easy cheap alternatives.

Cheap yes, easy no.

Anything that involves soldering is not even remotely comparable to solderless breadboards in terms of easiness for R&D. Nothing beats solderless breadboards for trying different circuits and different part values in hardware quickly and with zero waste.

It's only when you are settled on a specific circuit and component values that proceeding to soldering to build a working prototype makes sense, or, another scenario, when parasitics of the solderless breadboard make it impossible or too unreasonable to use in a specific case.

The world of electronics isn't limited by HF and fast digital circuits. And even for those solderless breadboards can be quite usable, as long as you know what you're doing.

You’re absolutely correct. But we can always count on tggzzz to find every mention of the word “breadboard” and inject his absolutist anti-breadboard stance into the discussion. He will never acknowledge or recognize that breadboards have their applications. I’ve tried explaining it multiple times but it’s like talking to a wall, except that walls aren’t as whiny.

[shabaz]

He's a time-waster when he wants to be. This derails the discussion, and his web pages serve up unwanted, unrelated adverts that cheapen whatever message he wishes to convey.

He did a similar thing on a thread about drawing tools, with a derailment on color blindness when it didn't apply; the OP wanted tools _specifically_ with the need for color diagrams.

Anyway, regarding breadboards, he mentioned The Art of Electronics in one of his discussions about his transistor circuit but forgot to mention that Horowitz & Hill state they actually use solderless breadboards for their course. It's good enough for their students.

Maybe he's forgotten that many of today's engineers were able to afford a breadboard, an LED, and a resistor long before they had any other decent equipment, and then gradually dip their toes into integrated circuits with a 555, and so on, all on a breadboard.

Almost every Forrest Mims book had a breadboard on the front cover—a lot more inviting to the discipline than a load of soldering/prototyping tools/consumables.

I've got a a pile of about 50 breadboards here.. and from experience am confident they will meet the needs (kids will be using them). They are not top-end breadboards (I have a few decent breadboards), but throwaway items after a few dozen experiments. I do try to use decent equipment when possible, but am aware that's a bit of a luxury most can't afford.

Regarding RF, another data-point: I demoed how to use a VNA to a group and used a (solderless) breadboard to show how to design the matching for a 10.7 MHz filter. There was really crude VNA calibration right on the breadboard (and was the first time some people had visually seen calibration steps, even if they would have to do that differently depending on the PCB or connectors for their needs one day). People appreciate a simple no-faff approach to learning something from scratch, eliminating any worries they may have had that it was too difficult to get into without a load of RF experience. No math either, since we had a Smith chart.

[shapirus]

Now, speaking of applications...

I've just been doing exactly what I described above as a typical application: building a subcircuit on a solderless breadboard to verify a concept that I had previously designed and verified in simulation. Simulation worked fine, but I needed to make sure that the power-on transition worked as I needed and just to test that it all generally worked in hardware.

The circuit involves debouncing two push buttons, which is implemented with some RC delays and 74LVC schmitt trigger input inverters (a hex inverter 74LVC14), and producing a single ~10 μs pulse per one button press. These pulses are fed into the inputs of an RS latch built of discrete 74LVC1G00 NAND gates, which do not have schmitt trigger inputs.

The part where the buttons and the outputs and inputs of the hex inverter IC were wired with short jumpers and resistors (even with uncut leads) worked just fine. But the RS latch part was built on a second breadboard (imagine the potential ground loops!) and while the Reset signal wire was short, the Set one was about 15 cm long in total and in addition made of two joined in series (connected on the breadboard).

Guess what, it failed: when the Set button (long wire) was pressed, the RS latch gates went into a state where apparently the CMOS output transistors were cross-conducting (the PSU went to CC mode at ~20 mA, so no ICs were harmed). Curiously, though, it went out of that state on the second press of that button. The Reset button, whose signal was sent over a short wire, worked fine.

What caused it? Well, if you send a pulse with a sub-nanosecond rising or falling edge over a crappy 15 cm-long wire that's terminated with whatever the solderless breadboard has to offer (not to mention the return path), you can guess what beauty the receiving end will see :).

Solution? Easy: add a series resistor right after the output pin to make the edge slower and thus reduce the reflections to more or less return the pulse to a good shape. Even as small as 47 Ohms one solved the problem (even though the signal seen by the scope at the target input pin was still ugly, but apparently good enough).

Conclusion? Know what you're doing and what can be causing the issues you're seeing and how to solve them to mitigate the limitations of your tools. And if you don't know what you're doing, still do it! Encounter problems, troubleshoot, search, read, learn, run simulations, and you'll know what you're doing the next time.

And of course it took much less time than it would have with soldering. Zero mess, zero fumes. Easy to fix mistakes, easy to hand pick and try various values of passive components. Solderless breadboards are cool*!

*but you'd better have an assortment of ZIF socket to DIP adapters for SMD stuff.

[tggzzz]

Too much hassle when there are easy cheap alternatives.

Cheap yes, easy no.

Anything that involves soldering is not even remotely comparable to solderless breadboards in terms of easiness for R&D. Nothing beats solderless breadboards for trying different circuits and different part values in hardware quickly and with zero waste.

It's only when you are settled on a specific circuit and component values that proceeding to soldering to build a working prototype makes sense, or, another scenario, when parasitics of the solderless breadboard make it impossible or too unreasonable to use in a specific case.

The world of electronics isn't limited by HF and fast digital circuits. And even for those solderless breadboards can be quite usable, as long as you know what you're doing.

You’re absolutely correct. But we can always count on tggzzz to find every mention of the word “breadboard” and inject his absolutist anti-breadboard stance into the discussion. He will never acknowledge or recognize that breadboards have their applications. I’ve tried explaining it multiple times but it’s like talking to a wall, except that walls aren’t as whiny.

That is a clear example of the pot calling the kettle black! Can I suggest you read the thread title and the first post, rather than just being a seagull.

This whole thread is about a problem the OP found using solderless breadboard, which disappeared when they used a better prototype technology.

Q.E.D.

[tggzzz]

...
Solution? Easy: add a series resistor right after the output pin to make the edge slower and thus reduce the reflections to more or less return the pulse to a good shape. Even as small as 47 Ohms one solved the problem (even though the signal seen by the scope at the target input pin was still ugly, but apparently good enough).
...

So, you created an experimental circuit, prototyped it, found the prototyping technique caused problems. Then you mutated your experimental circuit to work around the prototyping limitations.

Wouldn't it be more rational to change the prototyping technique?

Now you will have to re-re-implement your (mutated) circuit, making tests on the mutated circuit far less valuable.

[tggzzz]

I've got a a pile of about 50 breadboards here.. and from experience am confident they will meet the needs (kids will be using them). They are not top-end breadboards (I have a few decent breadboards), but throwaway items after a few dozen experiments. I do try to use decent equipment when possible, but am aware that's a bit of a luxury most can't afford.

Most people advocate using solderless breadboards so resistors are not disposable, and can be reused.

You regard solderless breadboards as disposable, after you have realised one has actually started causing you problems.

I must admit that profligacy never crossed my mind.

[shabaz]

You regard solderless breadboards as disposable...

I must admit that profligacy never crossed my mind.

I do regard the cheapest, very low-cost tools to have a finite life. Same as soldering irons. Your message is (again) a complete time-waste both for you and the reader.

[tggzzz]

Anyway, regarding breadboards, he mentioned The Art of Electronics in one of his discussions about his transistor circuit but forgot to mention that Horowitz & Hill state they actually use solderless breadboards for their course. It's good enough for their students.

Try understanding what Horowitz and Hill are saying in the passage you quoted.

They note a set or real-world problems.
In order to be able to use solderless breadboards they restrict students to using logic families introduced 41 years ago.
They state that using they can't use (more) modern logic families with solderless breadboards.

They have thoroughly tested the experiment before their students repeat the experiment for themselves.

Not a good advert for using solderless breadboards with modern logic for new circuits (i.e. not a repeat of a thoroughly known "crippled" circuit).

Thank you for highlighting some real problems with using solderless breadboards.

[shapirus]

So, you created an experimental circuit, prototyped it, found the prototyping technique caused problems. Then you mutated your experimental circuit to work around the prototyping limitations.

Yes. I knew what to expect and how to fix the reasons why things didn't work as expected. There is no qualitative difference with any other prototyping technique: whatever tool you use, you need to be aware of limitations and side effects.

Wouldn't it be more rational to change the prototyping technique?

No. It would have taken much more time, created flux fumes, and wasted some IPA to wash the board. And then, in case a mistake was found, I'd have to desolder, replace, resolder, and potentially wash the board again. I have no reason to believe that I would have made less mistakes on a soldering perfboard than I did on a solderless one, and I did make a few.

Of course there are legit cases when soldering is a must, like this, when the parasitics of a solderless breadboard will absolutely defeat the whole purpose of the circuit:



But the one I described wasn't one of them.

Now you will have to re-re-implement your (mutated) circuit, making tests on the mutated circuit far less valuable.

Very unlikely. It works in simulation, it works on a solderless breadboard, provided that measures are taken to maintain signal integrity (targeting a specific isolated issue), so there is no reason for it not to work on a final PCB, as long as the signal integrity considerations, of which I am well aware, are taken into account when it will be designed.

[tggzzz]

You regard solderless breadboards as disposable...

I must admit that profligacy never crossed my mind.

I do regard the cheapest, very low-cost tools to have a finite life. Same as soldering irons. Your message is (again) a complete time-waste both for you and the reader.

You snipped the real comparison: the cost of a resistor vs the cost of a solderless breadboard.

That's called being "penny wise and pound foolish", or"cent wise and dollar foolish" if you prefer.

[shabaz]

You snipped the real comparison...

Do whatever comparison you wish. It doesn't change the fact, that tools eventually wear out, and when they do, they get replaced.

[tggzzz]

So, you created an experimental circuit, prototyped it, found the prototyping technique caused problems. Then you mutated your experimental circuit to work around the prototyping limitations.

Yes. I knew what to expect and how to fix the reasons why things didn't work as expected. There is no qualitative difference with any other prototyping technique: whatever tool you use, you need to be aware of limitations and side effects.

Wouldn't it be more rational to change the prototyping technique?

No. It would have taken much more time, created flux fumes, and wasted some IPA to wash the board. And then, in case a mistake was found, I'd have to desolder, replace, resolder, and potentially wash the board again. I have no reason to believe that I would have made less mistakes on a soldering perfboard than I did on a solderless one, and I did make a few.

Why IPA on a circuit like that? I've never bothered. Low-noise high-impedance circuits, yes - but digital logic is by definition the opposite of that.

You say below that your circuit worked in simulation, so what mistakes (other than rushed carelessness?) might you have made?

Now you will have to re-re-implement your (mutated) circuit, making tests on the mutated circuit far less valuable.

Very unlikely. It works in simulation, it works on a solderless breadboard, provided that measures are taken to maintain signal integrity (targeting a specific isolated issue), so there is no reason for it not to work on a final PCB, as long as the signal integrity considerations, of which I am well aware, are taken into account when it will be designed.

So you simulated circuit 1, tested circuit 2, in the expectation that implementation of circuit 1 would work. And presumably built and re-tested that circuit.

Seems a long way around. Why bother with circuit 2? Why not just build 1 and test 1.

[tggzzz]

You snipped the real comparison...

Do whatever comparison you wish. It doesn't change the fact, that tools eventually wear out, and when they do, they get replaced.

Strawman arguments come round to bite you, and devalue any point you might have had.

[shapirus]

Why IPA on a circuit like that? I've never bothered. Low-noise high-impedance circuits, yes - but digital logic is by definition the opposite of that.

Just because I hate when the messy flux residue stays on my fingers when I handle the board that I'm testing. No I don't work in gloves and I don't use a vise to hold the board under test. Thus I usually wash them after soldering.

You say below that your circuit worked in simulation, so what mistakes (other than rushed carelessness?) might you have made?

Any that a human may make after a long day. Forget to connect a power rail, connect a jumper wire to the wrong side of the button etc. There is no DRC to automate this job (yet?)

So you simulated circuit 1, tested circuit 2, in the expectation that implementation of circuit 1 would work.

Seems a long way around. Why bother with circuit 2?

As far as this specific prototype is considered, it is the same circuit.

But that calls for another discussion: what can we consider the same circuit? What's drawn in an EDA software is one thing, assembled on a solderless breadboard is another, soldered on a perfboard is yet another, and then soldered on a PCB is another still -- yet all having the same components connected in the same order. There will always be difference caused by non-ideal conductors of a non-zero length. But that's really beyond what I'm willing to discuss in this thread.

[shabaz]

You snipped the real comparison...

Do whatever comparison you wish. It doesn't change the fact, that tools eventually wear out, and when they do, they get replaced.

Strawman arguments come round to bite you, and devalue any point you might have had.

I now recognize it's deliberate when you're in your time-wasting mode, you also get nasty. I'll simply go off and help elsewhere (if I can).

[tggzzz]

Anyway, regarding breadboards, he mentioned The Art of Electronics in one of his discussions about his transistor circuit but forgot to mention that Horowitz & Hill state they actually use solderless breadboards for their course.

Firstly you don't seem to understand what H&H were saying about the crippling preconditions necessary for that to happen.

Secondly you ignore that I told you where H&H pointed out that solderless breadboard construction caused the specific problem I discussed.

so here it is...

[tggzzz]

You snipped the real comparison...

Do whatever comparison you wish. It doesn't change the fact, that tools eventually wear out, and when they do, they get replaced.

Strawman arguments come round to bite you, and devalue any point you might have had.

I now recognize it's deliberate when you're in your time-wasting mode, you also get nasty. I'll simply go off and help elsewhere (if I can).

Strawman argument, such as you made, do indeed waste people's time. That annoys me.

[tggzzz]

Why IPA on a circuit like that? I've never bothered. Low-noise high-impedance circuits, yes - but digital logic is by definition the opposite of that.

Just because I hate when the messy flux residue stays on my fingers when I handle the board that I'm testing. No I don't work in gloves and I don't use a vise to hold the board under test. Thus I usually wash them after soldering.

Curious. I don't use gloves, don't use a vice, and don't notice any residue on my fingers. I wonder what's the source of the difference?

You say below that your circuit worked in simulation, so what mistakes (other than rushed carelessness?) might you have made?

Any that a human may make after a long day. Forget to connect a power rail, connect a jumper wire to the wrong side of the button etc. There is no DRC to automate this job (yet?)

You forgot "connect the power the wrong way round" I've done that both on the component and at the PSU.

After a few times I begin to learn to check before applying power; I'm a slow learner.

Haven't found a practical way of measuring the resistance between this resistor lead and that capacitor lead, but then I don't need to

So you simulated circuit 1, tested circuit 2, in the expectation that implementation of circuit 1 would work.

Seems a long way around. Why bother with circuit 2?

As far as this specific prototype is considered, it is the same circuit.

But that calls for another discussion: what can we consider the same circuit? What's drawn in an EDA software is one thing, assembled on a solderless breadboard is another, soldered on a perfboard is yet another, and then soldered on a PCB is another still -- yet all having the same components connected in the same order. There will always be difference caused by non-ideal conductors of a non-zero length. But that's really beyond what I'm willing to discuss in this thread.

That's exactly the point I made in that blog post: once all the solderless breadboard artefacts were included, the simulation agreed with the solderless breadboard behaviour. If you didn't use solderless breadboard it wouldn't be necessary to "retrofit" stray L/C to the simulation.

I like circuits where the behaviour of "non-ideal conductors" is inherent to the circuit operation, e.g. planar microwave filters and other "strange random" conductor shapes. I don't like it where the behaviour is accidental, destructive, and avoidable.

[shabaz]

That annoys me.

If a comment riles you up like this, then that's not normal.

If you think you have made something evident, then great, why do you need me to respond a certain way. Will it make you not feel annoyed if you can make me agree with you?

I only answered what was relevant, and I don't think it was strawman. I think your comments were more strawman, trying to compare the price of a resistor. That comment from you demonstrated your line of thinking, and I'm happy for it to rest with what you wrote.

[joeqsmith]

Why IPA on a circuit like that? I've never bothered. Low-noise high-impedance circuits, yes - but digital logic is by definition the opposite of that.

Just because I hate when the messy flux residue stays on my fingers when I handle the board that I'm testing. No I don't work in gloves and I don't use a vise to hold the board under test. Thus I usually wash them after soldering.

Curious. I don't use gloves, don't use a vice, and don't notice any residue on my fingers. I wonder what's the source of the difference?

Like shapirus, I clean everything I work on after soldering just out of general practice.  I use various solders but all are rosin core.  Some times I apply flux directly (flux pen) and also get sticky fingers as I don't wear gloves.   

..Guess what, it failed:
...
What caused it? Well, if you send a pulse with a sub-nanosecond rising or falling edge over a crappy 15 cm-long wire that's terminated with whatever the solderless breadboard has to offer (not to mention the return path), you can guess what beauty the receiving end will see .

Solution? Easy: add a series resistor right after the output pin to make the edge slower ...

Conclusion? Know what you're doing
...

I used to use wire wrap for my digital experiments.  The FPGAs did not have the drive strength control we have today.  The last board I made ran at a 100MHz.  I knew enough by then that getting that board working wasn't too bad.  But that is the reason for so many of those  series resistors in the DIP packages shown at 9:50 in.

[tggzzz]

Why IPA on a circuit like that? I've never bothered. Low-noise high-impedance circuits, yes - but digital logic is by definition the opposite of that.

Just because I hate when the messy flux residue stays on my fingers when I handle the board that I'm testing. No I don't work in gloves and I don't use a vise to hold the board under test. Thus I usually wash them after soldering.

Curious. I don't use gloves, don't use a vice, and don't notice any residue on my fingers. I wonder what's the source of the difference?

Like shapirus, I clean everything I work on after soldering just out of general practice.  I use various solders but all are rosin core.  Some times I apply flux directly (flux pen) and also get sticky fingers as I don't wear gloves.   

Flux pens -> sticky fingers. Too true. That has to be cleaned off. I mainly use that when repairing equipment, less so when making prototypes.

I'll clean anything permanent, but I won't bother with a half-built and/or throwaway prototype.

..Guess what, it failed:
...
What caused it? Well, if you send a pulse with a sub-nanosecond rising or falling edge over a crappy 15 cm-long wire that's terminated with whatever the solderless breadboard has to offer (not to mention the return path), you can guess what beauty the receiving end will see .

Solution? Easy: add a series resistor right after the output pin to make the edge slower ...

Conclusion? Know what you're doing
...

I used to use wire wrap for my digital experiments.  The FPGAs did not have the drive strength control we have today.  The last board I made ran at a 100MHz.  I knew enough by then that getting that board working wasn't too bad.  But that is the reason for so many of those  series resistors in the DIP packages shown at 9:50 in.

EDIT: after having bothered to look at the 20s of the video you pointed to... just so. Wire length (relative to risetime) is the source of the problem, and peversely adding the DIP resistors increases the length. Anyway...

I like wire-wrap, but the stub antennas are, um, suboptimal. Some production 70s computers were wire-wrapped. Wire-wrapped logic became obsolete by the mid 80s. Wire-wrap wire is still very useful; I have a lifetime's supply.

A better alternative to wire wrap was a board with pre-inserted pin sockets for ICs, where the other side of the pin was a 2-level IDC connector. The net result was a board with decent ground plane(s), 4 wires/pin like wire-wrap, with the wires fairly snugly placed agains the board.

Oh, the other net result was either a noticable reduction in a bank balance, or the need to go through the hoops for expensive purchase requests.

I haven't seen those boards in years. They were great for gradually building and testing a circuit function by function.

[tggzzz]

That annoys me.

If a comment riles you up like this, then that's not normal.

Strawman arguments (not comments) irritate many people. Not many people like their statements being deliberately distorted.

If you think you have made something evident, then great, why do you need me to respond a certain way. Will it make you not feel annoyed if you can make me agree with you?

That's a different subject, of course, and not an interesting one.

I only answered what was relevant, and I don't think it was strawman. I think your comments were more strawman, trying to compare the price of a resistor. That comment from you demonstrated your line of thinking, and I'm happy for it to rest with what you wrote.

I  noted that your contention, conflicts with contentions made by other solderless breadboard proponents. I noted I hadn't thought of your contention.

For clarity, and lest it be forgotten amongst all the snips, here it is again...

I've got a a pile of about 50 breadboards here.. and from experience am confident they will meet the needs (kids will be using them). They are not top-end breadboards (I have a few decent breadboards), but throwaway items after a few dozen experiments. I do try to use decent equipment when possible, but am aware that's a bit of a luxury most can't afford.

Most people advocate using solderless breadboards so resistors are not disposable, and can be reused.

You regard solderless breadboards as disposable, after you have realised one has actually started causing you problems.

I must admit that profligacy never crossed my mind.