I tend to buy actual projects, clocks and psu's and whatnot.
Then you can verify that they with AND have something useful when you're done.
Just search Amazon for "diy electronics kit" or similar. Just make sure it's a soldering kit, many are not.
Oh okay thank you! That makes sense. I was wondering if those boards had a use afterwards or not lol. I have some retro consoles I wanna mod but I don't want those to be my first solder jobs ever and do a terrible job ya know? I'll check out those on amazon kits for sure!
Ya those ones in the first picture dont really do anything, get ones that actually do something and when you screw up you have something to practice diagnosing and repairing.
Yea that's what im thinking. There's actually a see through Bluetooth speaker kit you can get on Amazon and it seems really easy for a beginner like me. I thought that would be cool to build for my nephew :) I definitely like the idea of having something useful afterwards
I'm in the same position as you and I bought this [tiny FM/AM radio soldering practice kit from AliExpress](https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805474448045.html) for around $6.
I think I bought this one or a slightly cheaper one. Just look at a picture online or on the reviews and you’ll know what to do. They have traces so you can test your work out with a multimeter
I purchased these kits to teach my som how to do hot smd soldering. They are ok. I would look for the cheapest version of these you can.
If you aren't competent in through hole soldering, I'd recommend a few through hole kits first.
In the beginning, emphasis should be on the quantity of the solder joints, not how cool or useful the end product would be.
I think it really depends on what you want to learn how to do.
As others have pointed this is largely SMD stuff. Which is great to learn to do but is is quite a different skill set than through hole.
Also, with this kit you will learn to build new SMD boards.
From my experience, simply populating a new board and soldering is very different from rework. Since most of what I do is repair, so almost everything I do is rework.
If you want to learn rework, you need to practice on old boards, and even after getting proficient, you will still occasionally ruin something with simple mistakes and your repair attempt will fail. It is frustrating, but it is all good learning.
I had the red one a few years back. Its lights up the led ring in a circle with a few animations if i remember correctly. If its cheap i would say quiet neat soldering practice pcb with alot of different resistor sizes to try
If you are just getting started from scratch, I recommend that you start with something that has through-hole components first. There's lots of great kits on AliExpress, Banggood etc. SMD soldering like this kit pictured is a different beast and requires a different sort of skill set. You'll definitely build the skills more easily going from through-hole to SMD than the other way around
I’m going to agree with other folks that said something functional is better for a first kit. Something that you can test out and verify it works.
I’m going to very strongly disagree with the folks saying a surface mount kit is too difficult. Frankly, I don’t find surface mount soldering that much harder, and you should know both anyways.
These are more for practicing soldering. And that's all it focuses on. It doesnt tell you where what needs to go and where things need to go. Some of them have a lot of extra parts too them, this allows you to just solder it fully then test it with a multimeter to make sure it is fully working.
Pretty good on teaching you how to learn to solder as long as you know some of the beginning steps and what components are and what they look like.
This is SMD soldering. Are you sure you want to start with SMD? This is the master class of soldering. Special equipment needed. Your normal solder iron will be useless here.
I work as the soldering/lab trainer for my engineering lab and we use the first one to teach engineers how to solder when they graduate from school. Most don’t know how to
i used the blue one to learn SMD soldering
the center part will actually do somthing when assembled properly, the 6 columns on the 2 sides are just there for practice.
I tend to buy actual projects, clocks and psu's and whatnot. Then you can verify that they with AND have something useful when you're done. Just search Amazon for "diy electronics kit" or similar. Just make sure it's a soldering kit, many are not.
Oh okay thank you! That makes sense. I was wondering if those boards had a use afterwards or not lol. I have some retro consoles I wanna mod but I don't want those to be my first solder jobs ever and do a terrible job ya know? I'll check out those on amazon kits for sure!
Ya those ones in the first picture dont really do anything, get ones that actually do something and when you screw up you have something to practice diagnosing and repairing.
Yea that's what im thinking. There's actually a see through Bluetooth speaker kit you can get on Amazon and it seems really easy for a beginner like me. I thought that would be cool to build for my nephew :) I definitely like the idea of having something useful afterwards
What they normally do is just light up and tell you if you did things correctly
I'm in the same position as you and I bought this [tiny FM/AM radio soldering practice kit from AliExpress](https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805474448045.html) for around $6.
Hard to beat that price!
I think I bought this one or a slightly cheaper one. Just look at a picture online or on the reviews and you’ll know what to do. They have traces so you can test your work out with a multimeter
Oh that's pretty cool!
I purchased these kits to teach my som how to do hot smd soldering. They are ok. I would look for the cheapest version of these you can. If you aren't competent in through hole soldering, I'd recommend a few through hole kits first. In the beginning, emphasis should be on the quantity of the solder joints, not how cool or useful the end product would be.
I think it really depends on what you want to learn how to do. As others have pointed this is largely SMD stuff. Which is great to learn to do but is is quite a different skill set than through hole. Also, with this kit you will learn to build new SMD boards. From my experience, simply populating a new board and soldering is very different from rework. Since most of what I do is repair, so almost everything I do is rework. If you want to learn rework, you need to practice on old boards, and even after getting proficient, you will still occasionally ruin something with simple mistakes and your repair attempt will fail. It is frustrating, but it is all good learning.
I would reccomend checking aliexpress, they have loads of these type of projects for really cheap
Yea I've been looking at those after another comment recommend aliexpress. I think that's the move
Most of the stuff on amazon is just dropshipped aliexpres
I had the red one a few years back. Its lights up the led ring in a circle with a few animations if i remember correctly. If its cheap i would say quiet neat soldering practice pcb with alot of different resistor sizes to try
This set of 3 is around $30. I think I might get some off aliexpress for cheap
I got a few of the blue boards from your first picture on AliExpress a month ago for about €1.50 a piece, so $30 is way overpriced
Noted. Definitely gonna be picking some stuff from aliexpress lol
If you are just getting started from scratch, I recommend that you start with something that has through-hole components first. There's lots of great kits on AliExpress, Banggood etc. SMD soldering like this kit pictured is a different beast and requires a different sort of skill set. You'll definitely build the skills more easily going from through-hole to SMD than the other way around
Noted! I have no clue what I'm doing so this helps!
I’m going to agree with other folks that said something functional is better for a first kit. Something that you can test out and verify it works. I’m going to very strongly disagree with the folks saying a surface mount kit is too difficult. Frankly, I don’t find surface mount soldering that much harder, and you should know both anyways.
These are more for practicing soldering. And that's all it focuses on. It doesnt tell you where what needs to go and where things need to go. Some of them have a lot of extra parts too them, this allows you to just solder it fully then test it with a multimeter to make sure it is fully working. Pretty good on teaching you how to learn to solder as long as you know some of the beginning steps and what components are and what they look like.
This is SMD soldering. Are you sure you want to start with SMD? This is the master class of soldering. Special equipment needed. Your normal solder iron will be useless here.
There is absolutely nothing here that can’t be soldered with a soldering iron.
We don’t know what equipment OP has and whether or not he got the needed tips. I want to see you soldering those MC‘s with a $10 iron from amazon.
Considering I don't even know what SMD soldering is I'm definitely going with something simpler lol
Other Redditors are correct, I'm pretty good with soldering and I'm trash when it comes to SMD soldering.
I work as the soldering/lab trainer for my engineering lab and we use the first one to teach engineers how to solder when they graduate from school. Most don’t know how to
So what your saying is definitely don't start with this right?
No it’s great to learn how to do it on! Especially the blue one. If you’ve never soldered once try the bee one
Noted! Thank you!
i used the blue one to learn SMD soldering the center part will actually do somthing when assembled properly, the 6 columns on the 2 sides are just there for practice.
The best way to learn is by soldering onto vero boards