I studied electronics in high school & college 45+ years ago, in the awkward period between when they stopped teaching about tubes and when they started teaching about ICs. After that I worked in a small shop that specialized in PA equipment for less than a year before moving on to the career I wanted since my early teens: Designing speakers.
I did that for at 2 speaker manufacturers that each became the largest in Canada while I was there and my name was mentioned in Audio Scene Canada magazine a few times (apparently the sales guys dropped my name a bit too).
The details aren't important but after a dozen years things were starting to sour and I no longer wanted to deal with furniture chain buyers like the guy that told us "That one is what I'd want in my own living room but I'm going to order this because I know our sales people can sell something that sounds like it. I'd put little piles of dirt with price tags on the sales floor if I could" (when the order came in the sales manager & I decided to call their models LPD-01, LPD-02 &c).
I had always wanted to move out of the city so we decided to raise our kids in a place where the air was worth breathing, you could see the stars at night and the roads had a lot less traffic, found a house near Lake Simcoe and I left my career in electronics behind.
I took a job at a local factory (5km from home), planning to keep looking until I found something I liked better. The work had absolutely noting to do with electronics but I found it interesting and ended up retiring from there 27 years later.
During most of the time since we left the city the only electronics I've done was some motorcycle wiring (including using LEDs as indicators in instrument panels and switch panels), a few small projects for my model trains (again including LEDs) and the occasional repair of something around the house.
I retired 5 years ago and spent the first few years catching up on household repairs/renos that I didn't have time for while working and learning how to grow most of our own vegetables. Last winter I decided it was time to deal with the mess in the basement workshop.
About 20 years ago we inherited the house my parents had built when they followed us out of the city and, since most of my shop time was keeping my motorcycles running I built a shop in the garage for that and didn't use the basement shop much so some of the stuff there was still where Dad had left it, often under other stuff I'd put there to deal with later.
I'm not sure what Dad had planned to use it for but there's a bench along the south wall of the shop that's about 1.3m long, 0.7m deep and 1m high that I decided it would become the first real electronics bench I've had since 1988 (seen here in March)
Which brings me to joining this forum. I've been on forums for my motorcycles and other things for years and I know how great a community of people with a common interest is. And I'm finding myself butting my head against some pretty basic stuff that I used to know so I figured it was about time I looked for an electronics forum where I can find people that might be able to help me figure some of this stuff out.
Just as an example, when I was in college one of our teachers arranged an annual bulk purchase of alligator clips and red and black rubber insulated wire for the first year students so we could make up sets of good clip leads. 45+ years later I think I still have 3 of them. I do have a set of longer clip leads with plastic insulated wire (not as supple as the rubber insulation was) that I got from Princess Auto in the garage shop for when I work on motorcycles &c but they aren't great for electronics and I'd like to keep them in the garage anyway.
Thanks to the miracle of ordering direct from China on eBay now have a couple of metres each of 7 colours of silicone insulated 16AWG wire and some of the little drawers in the shop closet are now full of alligator clips. I sat down the other day to start making them and realized I didn't have a clue how long they should be other than that the ones I have in the garage, which are about right for working on vehicles, are way too long for this. And of course, I couldn't find any recommendations online either.
I ended up deciding on 2 each of 30cm, 20cm and 10cm leads in each colour.
I really like the silicone wire I have also ordered the stuff I need to make up some better leads for the multimeters.
Anyway, this is getting waaaaaay too long and I have to get back to adding LEDs to Christmas cards. It's a bit basic but if you folks think it would be useful let me know and I'll start a thread about doing them.
I did that for at 2 speaker manufacturers that each became the largest in Canada while I was there and my name was mentioned in Audio Scene Canada magazine a few times (apparently the sales guys dropped my name a bit too).
The details aren't important but after a dozen years things were starting to sour and I no longer wanted to deal with furniture chain buyers like the guy that told us "That one is what I'd want in my own living room but I'm going to order this because I know our sales people can sell something that sounds like it. I'd put little piles of dirt with price tags on the sales floor if I could" (when the order came in the sales manager & I decided to call their models LPD-01, LPD-02 &c).
I had always wanted to move out of the city so we decided to raise our kids in a place where the air was worth breathing, you could see the stars at night and the roads had a lot less traffic, found a house near Lake Simcoe and I left my career in electronics behind.
I took a job at a local factory (5km from home), planning to keep looking until I found something I liked better. The work had absolutely noting to do with electronics but I found it interesting and ended up retiring from there 27 years later.
During most of the time since we left the city the only electronics I've done was some motorcycle wiring (including using LEDs as indicators in instrument panels and switch panels), a few small projects for my model trains (again including LEDs) and the occasional repair of something around the house.
I retired 5 years ago and spent the first few years catching up on household repairs/renos that I didn't have time for while working and learning how to grow most of our own vegetables. Last winter I decided it was time to deal with the mess in the basement workshop.
About 20 years ago we inherited the house my parents had built when they followed us out of the city and, since most of my shop time was keeping my motorcycles running I built a shop in the garage for that and didn't use the basement shop much so some of the stuff there was still where Dad had left it, often under other stuff I'd put there to deal with later.
I'm not sure what Dad had planned to use it for but there's a bench along the south wall of the shop that's about 1.3m long, 0.7m deep and 1m high that I decided it would become the first real electronics bench I've had since 1988 (seen here in March)
Which brings me to joining this forum. I've been on forums for my motorcycles and other things for years and I know how great a community of people with a common interest is. And I'm finding myself butting my head against some pretty basic stuff that I used to know so I figured it was about time I looked for an electronics forum where I can find people that might be able to help me figure some of this stuff out.
Just as an example, when I was in college one of our teachers arranged an annual bulk purchase of alligator clips and red and black rubber insulated wire for the first year students so we could make up sets of good clip leads. 45+ years later I think I still have 3 of them. I do have a set of longer clip leads with plastic insulated wire (not as supple as the rubber insulation was) that I got from Princess Auto in the garage shop for when I work on motorcycles &c but they aren't great for electronics and I'd like to keep them in the garage anyway.
Thanks to the miracle of ordering direct from China on eBay now have a couple of metres each of 7 colours of silicone insulated 16AWG wire and some of the little drawers in the shop closet are now full of alligator clips. I sat down the other day to start making them and realized I didn't have a clue how long they should be other than that the ones I have in the garage, which are about right for working on vehicles, are way too long for this. And of course, I couldn't find any recommendations online either.
I ended up deciding on 2 each of 30cm, 20cm and 10cm leads in each colour.
I really like the silicone wire I have also ordered the stuff I need to make up some better leads for the multimeters.
Anyway, this is getting waaaaaay too long and I have to get back to adding LEDs to Christmas cards. It's a bit basic but if you folks think it would be useful let me know and I'll start a thread about doing them.
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