Category Archives: Soldering & PCBs.

Making printed circuit boards and mastering the art of soldering. Well… or trying to :-)

Bad soldering day — A rip-off (literally)

Posted on July 8, 2010 by robert

Once in a while I sell one or two of the RGB LED RING boards. As not everybody feels comfortable with soldering SMD parts (and I’ve explicitly warned that it’s not that easy and that the RGB LEDs die easily) … Continue reading →

Posted in Electronics., Soldering & PCBs. | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

MSOP10/TSSOP8 – DIP adapters — they’ve finally arrived

Posted on December 17, 2009 by robert

I’ve waited almost 8 weeks… and finally the reward ;-) And I’ve already managed to solder the LT1618 boost converter chip to one of these. Compared to soldering TQFP-32 packages this screams for solder paste and a hot air station. … Continue reading →

Posted in DIY., Electronics., Soldering & PCBs. | Tagged , , | 9 Comments

RGB LED Toy — It works

Posted on December 9, 2009 by robert

Well… sort of. I finally got the PCBs from sparkfun! Almost 6 weeks, 9 days only for the “air mail” letter to get to me. Maybe my “dear friends” at the customs office were “busy” again. Unfortunately my request to … Continue reading →

Posted in Electronics., Soldering & PCBs. | Tagged , , , , , , | 15 Comments

RGB LED Toy — first order at BatchPCB

Posted on November 1, 2009 by robert

For quite some time I have 19 SMD RGB LEDs sitting in one of my electronics boxes. It used to be 20, but I’ve ruined one while trying to solder it to perfboard. They are 3 single LEDs put into … Continue reading →

Posted in Electronics., Soldering & PCBs. | Tagged , , , , , , | 13 Comments

Who needs cheap MSOP10/TSSOP8 to DIP adapters ?

Posted on October 16, 2009 by robert

Hi, I’ve been planning to build a prototype driver for the Seeedstudio LED module (1, 2) for quite a while, but I just cannot get MSOP-DIP adapters that are reasonably priced. The cheapest single one I could find was 2.50€! … Continue reading →

Posted in DIY., Electronics., Soldering & PCBs. | Tagged , , | 8 Comments