Spring cleaning..what to toss...what to keep.
Too_Many_Tools
Posts: 765
It's been awhile since I have culled my collection of electronics, computer electronics and test equipment....too much stuff for too little space.
So when you do a "spring cleaning" of your electronics collection, how do you decide what to keep and what to toss/recycle?
Thanks
So when you do a "spring cleaning" of your electronics collection, how do you decide what to keep and what to toss/recycle?
Thanks
Comments
1) Why do I have it?
Is it for a project idea? Was it given to me and I think it's neat? Did I buy it for some project? Is it one of those eventually will need it but never know type items?
2) Will I use it?
Will I ever get around to making the project idea I answered for #1? Do I need other parts, code, or $$ to make use of it?
3) Can I sell it to buy something else more useful to my active projects?
Can I use the funds from selling it to buy project items for something I will get around to?
A lot of my answers in my latest round of spring cleaning went like this:
1: for a neat project idea
2: Will probably never get around to the idea because I have too many others that are better
3: Yes, lots=eBay/Forums pile, Not much or No=HackerLab donation pile
Since I recently re-did my workbench, I discovered I have a lot of items that are begging for a Parallax Expo Freebie table. Since those are long gone, I am thinking of making some drops at the newly opened Rocklin Hacker Lab. I will eventually have a new spring cleaning post in the classifieds with items for sale and some "grab bags" for the cost of shipping (I stuff a ton of items into priority mail flat rate boxes, so $6 gets you a good selection of trinkets)
Next few days should see a )5+/-12V and +24V supply salvaged placed into a desk top box. GIG?. I guess
FF
I still have more. I'm going to talk to Xanadu about making a home for it, now that he has lots of office space.
Six months ago I sent the chassis, motors and wheels of my largest robot ever to recycle because it was taking up too much space. I tried selling it locally too. Yes, largest robot.
Needless to say I absolutely regret that.
Gordon you have some VIP space reserved
Over the years I have binned many things, usually under duress from parents or 'her in doors. So often I have regretted doing so later. One of the worst cases being the disposal of 10 years worth of Wireless World magazines from the late 1960's early 70's.
At least if these things had gone to a good home I would have the satisfaction of knowing that somebody got some use or pleasure out of them.
Hmmm...I'm currently still paying every month to keep a pile of stuff in storage where it found itself during our last house move. "You are not bringing that junk in here". Perhaps I should fetch it out of store and put it up for grabs.
Some things, like magazines or books, I'll donate. I had a collection of old (1950s) SAMS TV service manuals. I found a 'TV museum' on the Web and they were thrilled to get them.
I used to keep my large collection of resistors and capacitors in giant parts bin drawers. Then I realized I only ever used a couple of standard values anyway, so my parts bins went from five or six to just one. Truth be told, some of the aluminum electrolytic caps I've been saving all these years were from Olson's, and I bought them in the mid 1970s. I mean, really?
Erco actually didn't take all the stuff I offered. Silly him. In one bag I had a dozen or more brand new PC mount 5V DPDT relays. The guy's slipping!
Women's shoe boxes are hard to come by. When a woman buys a pair of shoes, she want the box to store them in. But when a man buys a pair of shoes, he just wants the shoes.
You might find a shoe store that is will to give you shoe boxes that are left behind by customers that don't want them. But I bet the majority will be men's shoes.
Then there is the case of Imelda Marcos:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2207353/Imelda-Marcos-legendary-3-000-plus-shoe-collection-destroyed-termites-floods-neglect.html
Their Hyfs series may be good for those who prefer shoeboxes, but I go for their 'Samla' series.
(Samla actually means 'to collect'... )
One for breadboards, one for wires, one for motors, one for microcontrollers, one for LEDs and LED assemblies, and so on...
I think I may need to visit IKEA again soon, to get a dozen or two more boxes...
Anyway...
Any interesting vintage electronics or books in the pile?
I collect home computers, PDAs, consoles, accessories, diagnostics tools, the weird and the wonderful,,,
I have collected ten 110V Primary transformers with secondary voltages ranging from 6 to 45 volts
and twenty wall-wart transformers - some with AC outputs and some with DC outputs (regulated and non-regulated).
Many of them are useful but some need to go - e.g. 45VAC secondary,
I hate to throw them away but don't want to spend hours trying to save the cooper.
I wonder if any recycle sites accept them...
If I haven't touched it in a year (other than get at something underneath it), I toss it. Unless its part of a project that I have been working on for ten years. Usually I get distracted by a project I hadn't realized I now have all the parts for, and start back in on that and do cleaning next year.
This year I tossed (to electronics recyclling) all old PC's Pentium and lower, all tube monitors, VGA, EGA, CGA, and monochorme video cards, all modems 38400 baud and lower.
Also did in the scraps and spares of wood and metal parts if I could not figure out either where they care from or where they were supposed to go.
My shop space almost doubled. OF course, all the junk that the recyclers wouldn't take is in the garage now, and I'm getting motivated to get a dumpster bag.
But a little bit each weekend got me this far in only 6 weeks.
Ron,
I've been able to dispose of my electrical junk (old motors, transformers, etc.) by taking them to a local metal recycler. I usually get just enough to cover the gas for the trip out to the boonies and back, but I feel better knowing that the copper, etc. will be recycled.
Side note: I hate to throw anything away. I'll strip hardware (screws, nuts, etc.), switches, whatever if I think it'll be useful from broken appliances. My definition of useful may not agree with anyone else's, but it's my mess, I mean garage!
Walter
@
And weight?
Any floppies to go with it?
That's my hoarding problem. I have it on my inventory list, but I don't know which of the 50 boxes it's in.
I know it is a Shugart 1/2 height. I don't know if I still have the full heights. I have about a dozen floppies from when I worked at Gerber.
As others have stated, I rarely throw anything away into the garbage can. When I say "toss it", I mean it goes to recycling or donation pile for a nearby 2 year college where I reside on the Electronics Department Advisory committee.
I work on quite a few machines with floppy only, no network, usb or optical drives. One of them runs a mill that shapes orthopedics. The podiatrist has a quote for an upgrade and it's $15,000. Floppies away! For those I have a few ATX style drives, but I don't leave them on site.
There's the ordinary floppy-connector on the back, but in front, instead of a slot for a 3.5" diskette, there's an USB-connector.
To the host computer, it looks like an ordinary 3.5" floppy drive.
The only 'problem' is that the USB-drive needs to be prepared with special SW.
(It divides it into 1.44MB images)
There's a small LCD and a pair of buttons on the front of the drive so that you can switch between the images easily.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/3-5-144MB-Upgrade-Floppy-Drive-to-USB-Flash-Disk-Drive-Emulator-CD-Screws-SU-/201190315032?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2ed7e09418
I don't have any R/W CDs (that's rewritable, right?), but I have had 1 year old backup CDs fail. Factory written CDs are different, they're mechanically pressed and last a long time.
-Tor