MightyOhm

Since creating the Electronics Workbench Flickr group last November, I have received lots and lots of really amazing submissions from electronics hobbyists and professionals around the world.

My two biggest takeaways so far? I do not own nearly enough test equipment, and my shop is not nearly as well-organized or space-efficient as it could be (I need to use all available wall space and build up).

Here are a few of my favorite images from the group:

Click any of these images for a larger version!

Joe Grand (of Prototype This! and Grand Idea Studio) and his awesome electronics workshop:

(Nice scope, Joe!)

blalor turned his BMW into a temporary workshop, and his passenger seat is the electronics workbench (note the laptop perched on the dash):

eschlaep (Eric Schlaepfer of tubetime.us) submitted this moody shot of a CRT project in progress:

Senke2 has a nice home lab with a lofty feel:

Looks like *someone* has a Tektronix fetish. Beautiful setup by Alan (W2AEW):

More scope envy, of both the oscillo- and micro- kinds (Thanks Mgburr!):

embeddederic sent in this picture of his workbench. Note the Tek 491 spectrum analyzer up top, 10MHz – 12GHz with 1950s(?) technology:

And lastly, check out this awesome workbench panorama by anachrocomputer (best viewed large):

See if you can spot the Tektronix 575 curve tracer!

There are lots more great photos in the group photo pool.

Do you have an electronics workbench that you’re proud of? Snap a photo and share it with the group!

Ahh, the electronics workbench – shrine to the electron, the diode, the transistor, the soldering pencil and flux pen.

You can learn a lot about someone by looking at their workspace. Note the way that they store components (in pullout drawers or plastic organizers?), hang test leads (on hooks or wire racks, or on a nail?), and keep spools of wire at the ready for repairs and new projects.

A look at someone’s electronics workbench gives you a small glimpse into what is usually a fairly personal space – a space where visions become reality and electronics projects are brought to life.

While there are quite a few electronics workbenches on flickr, I determined after a quick search that there had been no attempt to bring all of these glimpses into a hobbyist or engineer’s soul together into one place.

And thus was born the Electronics Workbench flickr group:

Have a photo of your bench? Add it to the group!

No? Then go downstairs into your basement, out into your garage, or up into the attic and take one!

And don’t spend too much time cleaning it up first – noone will believe you that your workbench is that clean when we’re not looking.

Also, a shoutout: This group was inspired in part by the Workbench of the Week (WOTW) page over at The Amp Hour. I don’t think WOTW has been a feature on the show for several months. Maybe we can get Chris and Dave to bring it back??

Happy soldering!

- Jeff

www.flickr.com More in Electronics Workbench pool

David July, who runs sutrotower.org, posted a fascinating set of pictures documenting his tour of San Francisco’s Sutro Tower.

PCB Photo Pool Screensaver

One of my favorite ways to keep tabs on the Printed Circuit Boards Group on Flickr is with OS X’s built-in ability to turn an RSS feed into a screen saver, as shown above.

To create this cool and constantly changing screen saver, open the “Desktop & Screen Saver” pane of the OS X System Preferences, as shown below.

Click the + button and select “Add RSS Feed…”  OS X will prompt you for an RSS feed URL to use for the screen saver.  Enter

http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/groups_pool.gne?id=812901@N20&lang=en-us

and click OK.

Make sure that the Display Style is set to “Collage” mode (the center option) as shown above.  Click Test and you should see photos from the pool appear on your screen.  Now the next time your screen saver activates, you should see a collage of cool photos from the PCB photo pool.

That’s it!

PS. If anyone knows of an equivalent screen saver for Windows or Linux, please let me know in the comments.  I don’t want OS X users to have all the fun!

Did my Wifi Radio project inspire you to buy a wireless router and start hacking?  If so, I’d like to hear from you!

Leave a comment below and let me know how your project is coming along.  Even if you’re not building a Wifi Radio but used my firmware or tutorials as a starting point (a great example is the Tweet-a-Watt), I’d love to hear from you.

If you have photos of your project, you can share them with the world by adding them to the Asus Wireless Router Hacks photo pool on flickr.

www.flickr.com More in Asus Wireless Router Hacks pool