On topic: Teaching kids engineering
in [Design]
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From: Nico Coesel on 14 Jun 2010 18:00 Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: >Nico Coesel wrote: >> Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: >> >>> Jan Panteltje wrote: >>>> On a sunny day (Mon, 14 Jun 2010 10:50:48 -0700) it happened Joerg >>>> <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote in <87n8frFlm8U1(a)mid.individual.net>: >>>> >>>>> Jan Panteltje wrote: >>>>>> On topic: Teaching kids engineering: >>>>>> http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/14/education/14engineering.html?partner=rss&emc=rss >>>>> Interesting. Do they do something like that in the Netherlands? >>>> Not that I know, but it has been a while since I was in kindergarten :-) >>>> I have mentioned many times in newsgroups that all kids learn these days is 'parroting'. >>>> There is just too much info dumped on these kids, maybe to keep them of the streets. >> >> There is so much to get interested in. I see the same thing with my >> kids. My oldest son isn't interested in technical stuff at all. I >> still have hope for my youngest son though. However finding a >> not-so-crappy electronics experiments kit is a real PITA though. >> > >I think in Europe there is still Galileo, Kosmos and Busch. Maybe more. >Ask in a NG there. Thanks. I'll check it out. >>>> I would have loved internet, so much you can discover. >>>> It was very difficult to get any good educational material at that age. >>>> Maybe not all of them, but those that do have it in them will. >>>> >>> They will. In our days we were also very free, much more so than today's >>> school kids. The epitome of joy were bulk waste days, when people put >>> their old radio and TV sets out to the curb. That netted me so much in >>> parts that I rarely needed moeny to build stuff. >> >> Yeah the good old days. Where I lived they also had bulk waste days >> once per month. People could pile their large garbage at designated >> > >Nowadays, if you strike up a nice conversation at a recycling center you >might be able to cajole them into giving you some old modems and stuff. I rather get rid of such junk :-) Every know and then I bring stuff back from the recycling center though. Mostly TFT screens. These are easy to fix and handy to have around. One day I found an HP 6038 power supply over there. Working perfectly except a knob was missing. Pity it got stolen from me. Easy comes easy goes... >There's a ton more variety of parts to be had than in our days. And all >you really need to scavenge is a good heat gun. Plus patience, to Yes and no. SMD parts are so cheap these days it is hardly worth the effort. Back in the old days I have desoldered a lot of parts. I still have huge loads of 4000 CMOS and 74 TTL-ish chips in DIP packages. -- Failure does not prove something is impossible, failure simply indicates you are not using the right tools... nico(a)nctdevpuntnl (punt=.) --------------------------------------------------------------
From: Joerg on 14 Jun 2010 18:09 Nico Coesel wrote: > Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: > [...] >> Nowadays, if you strike up a nice conversation at a recycling center you >> might be able to cajole them into giving you some old modems and stuff. > > I rather get rid of such junk :-) Every know and then I bring stuff > back from the recycling center though. Mostly TFT screens. These are > easy to fix and handy to have around. ... On LCDs it's often busted backlight inverter transistors. What's the typical damage on TFTs? > ... One day I found an HP 6038 power > supply over there. Working perfectly except a knob was missing. Pity > it got stolen from me. Easy comes easy goes... > >> There's a ton more variety of parts to be had than in our days. And all >> you really need to scavenge is a good heat gun. Plus patience, to > > Yes and no. SMD parts are so cheap these days it is hardly worth the > effort. Back in the old days I have desoldered a lot of parts. I still > have huge loads of 4000 CMOS and 74 TTL-ish chips in DIP packages. > Ok, but things like a 100mW wideband GHZ RF amp do cost a few Euros. I don't know what kids over there get as allowance these days but that's a lot of money. Same for HD-44780 compatible LCD modules. Those are 5-10 Euros. Free and ready to use if you scrap them out of a discarded fax machine. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
From: Nico Coesel on 14 Jun 2010 18:42 Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: >Nico Coesel wrote: >> Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: >> >[...] > >>> Nowadays, if you strike up a nice conversation at a recycling center you >>> might be able to cajole them into giving you some old modems and stuff. >> >> I rather get rid of such junk :-) Every know and then I bring stuff >> back from the recycling center though. Mostly TFT screens. These are >> easy to fix and handy to have around. ... > > >On LCDs it's often busted backlight inverter transistors. What's the >typical damage on TFTs? So far I've found bad capacitors, bad solder joints and fusible resistors. Bad solder joints in the PSU may cause catastrophic failures. >> ... One day I found an HP 6038 power >> supply over there. Working perfectly except a knob was missing. Pity >> it got stolen from me. Easy comes easy goes... >> >>> There's a ton more variety of parts to be had than in our days. And all >>> you really need to scavenge is a good heat gun. Plus patience, to >> >> Yes and no. SMD parts are so cheap these days it is hardly worth the >> effort. Back in the old days I have desoldered a lot of parts. I still >> have huge loads of 4000 CMOS and 74 TTL-ish chips in DIP packages. >> > >Ok, but things like a 100mW wideband GHZ RF amp do cost a few Euros. I >don't know what kids over there get as allowance these days but that's a >lot of money. Same for HD-44780 compatible LCD modules. Those are 5-10 >Euros. Free and ready to use if you scrap them out of a discarded fax >machine. I recently came across several of those displays in all shapes and sizes when going through my old stock. Anyway I wouldn't mind spending a few euro's on a sensible project. The experience gained is worth many times more than the money spend. -- Failure does not prove something is impossible, failure simply indicates you are not using the right tools... nico(a)nctdevpuntnl (punt=.) --------------------------------------------------------------
From: Joerg on 14 Jun 2010 18:55 Nico Coesel wrote: > Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: > >> Nico Coesel wrote: >>> Joerg <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote: >>> >> [...] >> >>>> Nowadays, if you strike up a nice conversation at a recycling center you >>>> might be able to cajole them into giving you some old modems and stuff. >>> I rather get rid of such junk :-) Every know and then I bring stuff >>> back from the recycling center though. Mostly TFT screens. These are >>> easy to fix and handy to have around. ... >> >> On LCDs it's often busted backlight inverter transistors. What's the >> typical damage on TFTs? > > So far I've found bad capacitors, bad solder joints and fusible > resistors. Bad solder joints in the PSU may cause catastrophic > failures. > I've heard that a lot but mostly from Europeans. You must have gotten a barrage of sour capacitors. The only one that died here was the buffer cap in a rather old Minolta camera. >>> ... One day I found an HP 6038 power >>> supply over there. Working perfectly except a knob was missing. Pity >>> it got stolen from me. Easy comes easy goes... >>> >>>> There's a ton more variety of parts to be had than in our days. And all >>>> you really need to scavenge is a good heat gun. Plus patience, to >>> Yes and no. SMD parts are so cheap these days it is hardly worth the >>> effort. Back in the old days I have desoldered a lot of parts. I still >>> have huge loads of 4000 CMOS and 74 TTL-ish chips in DIP packages. >>> >> Ok, but things like a 100mW wideband GHZ RF amp do cost a few Euros. I >> don't know what kids over there get as allowance these days but that's a >> lot of money. Same for HD-44780 compatible LCD modules. Those are 5-10 >> Euros. Free and ready to use if you scrap them out of a discarded fax >> machine. > > I recently came across several of those displays in all shapes and > sizes when going through my old stock. Anyway I wouldn't mind spending > a few euro's on a sensible project. The experience gained is worth > many times more than the money spend. > Sure, but back in my days spending a few Deutschmarks or later Guilders was not so easy. Because they simply weren't there most of the time. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
From: Joel Koltner on 14 Jun 2010 19:19
"Joerg" <invalid(a)invalid.invalid> wrote in message news:87nqbmF480U1(a)mid.individual.net... > Sure, but back in my days spending a few Deutschmarks or later Guilders > was not so easy. Because they simply weren't there most of the time. I'm OK with giving kids some allowance for doing chores or whatever given that these days it's pretty much impossible for a kid to find a regular paying job until they're 16 or older. When I was first in college those HD44780 displays were 3/$24 from Timeline, Inc. -- as advertised in Circuit Cellar Ink. At that point I had a job making something like $5.50/hour, and I'm pretty sure I would have rather worked another couple of hours to get one rather than tearing apart discarded FAX machines (or whatever) and crossing my fingers that it really was a working HD44780-compatible unit -- since I expect that would have taken rather *more* than a couple of hours total. :-) On the other hand, you did occasionally come across wondeful things like discarded fractional-kilowatt transformers or VARIAC cores -- THOSE were definitely worth hauling away, even when they weighed 40lbs.! (There were also a lot of multi-kilowatt transformers down in the basement of the building I worked in... they still belonged to the University, but since they weren't being used, usually it was no problem borrowing them if you could find the right person to ask... although sometimes the things had been sitting there for many years, and no one seemed to know who that person was...) ---Joel |