Needing Direction

raulduke1011

I have just completed the 'What is a Microcontroller' and 'Boe Bot' kits and feel that I have enough knowledge to tinker around with some small experiments of my own. However, I have no experience with soldering and this is the direction in which I would like to go with soldering my first live experiment onto a carrier board. Can anyone advise me on what the next step in my path should be? Whether it be another Parallax kit or whatever, any advice would be appreciated. Thanks.

Mike Green

Practice soldering. You can find all sorts of articles on the internet about this. Here's one: www.mtechnologies.com/building/atoz.htm.

Don't solder on a carrier board until you have a permanent project that you'd like to construct.
You might start with one or more DIY project kits that you could talk yourself into "needing".
One vendor is www.electronickits.com/kit/complete/complete.htm.

The main question for you is "what do you want to do?" or "what are you interested in?"

raulduke1011

Thanks Mike for the speedy response. My goal is an ongoing education and hobby of building robots. I write software for a living and the Boe bot has really got me excited about robotics. It's really fulfilling to see your programs come to life in the real world. So to be more precise, I am looking to create my first permanent robot(pretty much the boe-bot that rolls around and uses it's sensors to do various things). I'm guessing I just need the stamp and carrier board and then I can solder my jumpers, resistors, etc instead of plugging them into the bread board. The goal is just to complete my first robot(permanent, soldered) as a stepping stone. Thanks.

Ugha

If you don't want to try one of the "learn to solder" kits out there...
I recommend you start small.

Figure out what your project is going to require then solder down one reusable "system" onto a piece of perf board.

For example:
The voltage regulation section can be one system.
The H-bridge motor controller could be one system.
A central "sensor bank" to connect all you sensors to could be one system.

In my case, I'm making a fading LED and piezo into one system (they are tied together)
and then later put it into my robot's head.

Another "system" that'll be in my robot's head will be sound detection. That'll be on its
own board as well.

If you take apart an electronic toy robot, you'll see its made up of several boards connected
by wires. The reasons are many but I find its easy to replace broken systems, easier for
debugging and easy to recycle when you get board with this project and want to move onto
another.

Hint: Put headers on your boards and use cables to connect them. I especially like the
servo extension cables that Parallax has.

raulduke1011

Brilliant. Thanks Ugha. That is the idea that I was looking for. So simple yet it has got the wheels in my head turning again and I will be on my way to Fry's Electronics after work to get this thing rolling again. Great post.

Ugha

Glad I could help [noparse]:)[/noparse]

One more suggestion if your just getting into soldering...

If you got one of those soldering kits that comes with a helping hands and sponge and such... Ditch the sponge and get a
good one.

You'll end up ruining your iron with a crappy sponge... as I've found out [noparse]:([/noparse]

Also, make sure you DO have a helping hands. It's amazing how many problems (and burns!) it prevents.

I also recommend a heat sink if your working close to fragile parts. I like the small ones you can clip on.