With the amount of fully functional development boards out there like
arduinos, raspberry pi's, beaglebones things like that, you don't need to use
breadboards nearly as often as you used to. However, if you're gonna do a whole
lot of electronics with basically any custom hardware, you're going to need to use them.
So we're gonna go over them really quick. They're pretty simple but
we're gonna try and take that learning curve from not very steep to absolutely zero.
I have here a couple of examples of breadboards that I have laying around
and basically they're just different sizes. We have this really tiny one,
the half size, the full size and then the full size on basically a different platform.
You'll see all of them share something in common and one of them is that
they are separated in two rows which go this way and columns which go this way.
The way that the rows and the columns work is that the rows are electrically
connected whereas the columns are not. On this particular one,
and you can see it actually with all these other ones as well,
A, B, C, D and E in Row 1 are all connected together. And then F, G, H, I, J are all connected in Row 1.
But anything in Row 1 down to Row 30 on this is not connected in any way.
You can use this to basically connect the things that you want to
and not connect the things that you don't want to.
One important thing as you're doing this is to note that all of these
are separated by exactly 1/10 of an inch so .1 inch pitch and that's really helpful
when you are using DIP packages or you're getting complicated IC's - things like that.
Those DIP packages are designed specifically so you can just plop these in here.
I always recommend a socket with that but that is why they're designed
that way - to fit into bread boards so you can test them out easily.
Also, while looking at this since it's numbered and lettered across this, you can literally say
exactly which hole you're going to plug things into. So I could say I want to plug into 15 C.
Some people when they're getting into really complicated circuits,
they are going to need that sort of precision. Also, if you are following something
and you're new, that's a good way to make sure you don't screw things up
as you go exactly where they tell you to.
But once you get more comfortable with it, you can take some liberties exactly
where is most convenient for you. Another thing to note that is only on these
and not on the smallest one, is there are these strips on the side - you get the
plus and the minus, plus, minus. Now these are buses. So all of these
plus right there are connected. All of these minus there are connected.
The reason this is fantastic is if you have five volts, you just power supply in
plug it in there and now that entire line is five volts so if you have different IC's with
the same voltage needed, you can just pull off of that and obviously
everything needs to be grounded so you can ground the blue line, the negative line,
and then you can pull that and ground your IC's or whatever else you need to.
So that's very helpful. One important thing to remember though
is on the bigger one, these are actually split. Right here in the middle you'll notice
there's a break in that line - the blue and the red - so all of these are connected
and all these are connected but this is not connected to that.
The first time I realized that was very frustrating because I could not figure out
why I wasn't getting power. Now, a simple way to do this is
just get a quick jumper unless you need a separate power rail.
You just plug it in and voila, now those are connected.
But if you need 5V for one thing and 3.3V for another thing,
you can put your 5 volts over here and your 3.3 volts over there
and it's a great way to get those separate voltage rails.
The reason that though I can't think of a time when you'd need that
so it's mostly just annoying for me. Another thing you'll notice on these is
you have a couple of spots right here and if you look closely
you can actually tell that they are suited specifically for banana plugs.
This is to be able to bring power from your power supply without any problems.
You just go and plug it in and that way, you're not dealing with these hooks
right here and like trying to get connections on here and plugging it in.
It just simplifies your life a little bit because you plug in like that and then
using the wire - not necessarily this - you can stick this in here, tighten it up
and then put the power exactly where you want to put it.
I use that feature on occasion, it's actually not too difficult for me to use the hook
but if you want to move from one place to another and use different power supplies
easily that's one benefit. So that is why those are there.
So that's the basic way that the breadboards are set up and how you use them.
There are a couple of common pitfalls that I want to recommend that
you pay attention to and make sure that they don't happen to you.
One of the biggest ones is having things touch that aren't supposed to touch.
I have these two resistors and they're all bent up and when you put them in,
a lot of that metal is still exposed so you want to make sure that
you don't put one into a spot and then put the other one in
and then have them touching in areas that they aren't supposed to be.
I'm just going to use this as a terrible example so I'm putting this above it
and these are really bent and then having it touch like that.
I'm not sure how easily you can see that but even though these aren't supposed
to be connected since they're touching right there they are electrically connected
and you're going to have problems. So this is very common.
That actually is something that can be reduced by another common pitfall.
One that I personally struggle with a lot and that is keep your breadboard clean.
As you can see with these long leads and they get all bent
and you want to reuse the resistors, if you're a cheapskate like me
then you start to have problems. But when you approach your breadboard,
do it with a plan in mind, try and keep your wires and your leads
as trimmed as possible and try and make it have an organized outline
not only will it make it less likely that you touch things that you
weren't supposed to be touching, it'll also make it so you leave the project
for 2 to 3 weeks, 2 to 3 months, you come back and you actually know
what's going on because you'll think oh, I know what I'm doing there.
But you probably won't, so try and keep it as clean as possible
so it's more understandable and less likely to cause problems
and you also notice when things aren't connected that should be connected and vice versa.
One other thing, as you probably just noticed as I was dealing with this,
I was struggling to push these in with some of these leads and some
new breadboards, it can be kind of tough to get the lead in
so make sure the leads actually in instead of just okay that's it.
That's not electrically connected and it will cause problems.
Every time you put something in, just make sure you can visually see it going
which is hard, because it's just a single piece of silver and you can't tell very well
that you can kind of get the feel if you're paying attention, you're good to go.
So that's one thing to watch out for and the final thing that I would say with these
to watch out for is making sure you don't accidentally connect things to power into ground.
Again you have these rails here and if you think, okay I'm plugging
this into power and you aren't paying attention and you plugged it in the ground.
At best, it just won't work.
At worst, something's going to be short-circuited and you're gonna have
serious problems so just pay attention, be precise, be careful.
Sometimes I get in a rush and that's why my breadboards
are always messier than they should be.
So do as I say, not as I do. Calm it down, be precise.
Pay attention to what you're doing and it'll definitely pay off in the long run.
As it is, I hope that you learned something, I hope you enjoy this.
If you have any questions or comments, just put it in below and
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