Steve Jones
Well-known member
Buy a cheap drill press! You will be happy you did every time you use it.
Before you start your project:
Go to the electronics store and buy an "M3" kit, ie: a couple of bags of black M3 screws in a couple of lengths, flat washers, star washers, nuts, (self locking with nylon inserts even better) solder tags, nylon spacers, metal spacers, a tiny ring spanner to suit the nuts, and keep them all together as a kit, you will soon realize how often you need to use these things when you are building anything.
Ditto for a bag of small cable ties, and if you are of that bent, some lacing twine and a needle.
Buy a GOOD pair of diagonal cutters, and a sheetmetal nibbling tool.
ALWAYS use a centre punch, and always drill a pilot hole. Always carefully mark out your metalwork and re-check before centrepunching.
Check each resistor with a multimeter before putting it in. It can be very difficult to faultfind a circuit with wrong resistors and it is a real pain looking for wrong values once the board is built. There is nothing worse than looking for a fault if you don't even know if the correct components are in the PCB!
Always use IC sockets.
Power up the device in stages - (this is why it is good to use IC sockets) - first check the output of the mains transformer secondaries before you connect them to the PCB. This verifies the mains wiring. If it is good, remove all the IC's or tubes, run up the unit and see if the DC supply rails on the board are good, thus verifying the rectifiers and regulators. Only then plug in the expensive bits and re-power.
Finally, if your house doesn't have them, spend the 20 bucks and get one of those mains extension leads with an earth leakage breaker on it, and plug your DIY into it as you work to give yourself some extra protection. Remember also to get into the habit of checking that the unit is indeed off before you plug or unplug chips or tubes.
Before you start your project:
Go to the electronics store and buy an "M3" kit, ie: a couple of bags of black M3 screws in a couple of lengths, flat washers, star washers, nuts, (self locking with nylon inserts even better) solder tags, nylon spacers, metal spacers, a tiny ring spanner to suit the nuts, and keep them all together as a kit, you will soon realize how often you need to use these things when you are building anything.
Ditto for a bag of small cable ties, and if you are of that bent, some lacing twine and a needle.
Buy a GOOD pair of diagonal cutters, and a sheetmetal nibbling tool.
ALWAYS use a centre punch, and always drill a pilot hole. Always carefully mark out your metalwork and re-check before centrepunching.
Check each resistor with a multimeter before putting it in. It can be very difficult to faultfind a circuit with wrong resistors and it is a real pain looking for wrong values once the board is built. There is nothing worse than looking for a fault if you don't even know if the correct components are in the PCB!
Always use IC sockets.
Power up the device in stages - (this is why it is good to use IC sockets) - first check the output of the mains transformer secondaries before you connect them to the PCB. This verifies the mains wiring. If it is good, remove all the IC's or tubes, run up the unit and see if the DC supply rails on the board are good, thus verifying the rectifiers and regulators. Only then plug in the expensive bits and re-power.
Finally, if your house doesn't have them, spend the 20 bucks and get one of those mains extension leads with an earth leakage breaker on it, and plug your DIY into it as you work to give yourself some extra protection. Remember also to get into the habit of checking that the unit is indeed off before you plug or unplug chips or tubes.
