Hey!

I know many of you have been asking about learning to solder and even "Deadbugging" circuits. Well I am excited to take on this suggestion and go for it. I'd like to get a club project together to learn to solder and resultantly build a simple (less than 10 or so parts!) "Light" receiver. They are very fun and useful as you can find many different things from seemingly boring lights and other devices. it can also be used for communications as the same circuit was used to build the receiver for my LASER communications project that shot across parts of the campus a few years ago! Off the top of my head the parts price for everything would be likely under $5 especially if many people buy it. For first time "solderers" this is still a very simple project that we can all build together in an hour or two. If we have time we can even hook them up to oscilloscopes and "See" what the lights and other devices look like around us. It is really neat stuff considering how simple they are.

What do you think?

Sounds like a plan. What happened to the FM transmitter kit? That came out pretty neat last year and I would love to see it be made. If you come up with a PCB layout I can etch it at home to test if you want.

Yes I would still love to do the FM transmitter but I think for first time solders, dead bugging a VHF circuit would be to much of a problem as your not only trying to learn dead bugging but proper construction at VHF frequencies! I may go with a super cheap PCB123 etch without solder mask or Silk Screen or just etch them ourselves. People have been specifically asking about dead bugging though!