Arduino Blinking Lights
During this unit, we explored the uses of Arduino and came to understand the basics of electronics like voltage, polarity, and parallel structure versus a system. I personally had never encountered any electronics before, so I also learned what resistors are, how to code on Arduino, and how certain hardware works.
This video shows the results of the mini-projects in snap circuits, Arduino, and soldering.
Soldering
- Prepare your materials: a soldering iron, stand, sponge or brass wool, wire cutters, and solder.
- Turn on your soldering iron. Wait until the temperature is around 700 degrees.
- Do not start soldering until the temperature is at this point, otherwise, the solder will not be hot enough and you will make solder balls.
- Be aware of safety measures:
- Do not touch the soldering iron’s tip under any circumstances.
- Always put the soldering iron into the stand when setting it down.
- Be aware of your surroundings.
- Do not make sudden movements while holding the soldering iron; you may burn someone.
- Put your component into the breadboard and either secure with tape or simply bend the wire back so it doesn’t move.
- Hold the soldering iron like a pencil, but again, do not touch the metal part of the iron.
- “Tin” your soldering iron by dabbing it into the brass wool. The tip should be shiny.
- Heat the ring of the breadboard with the tip of the soldering iron.
- Apply the solder to the breadboard. It will melt when it comes in contact with the metal and/or the tip of the soldering iron.
- Make sure you have applied enough solder to the ring, but also make sure that you don't have too much solder and create a solder bridge. It should look like a little volcano.
- Take wire cutters (electrical or normal) to cut the excess of the wire.
Notes:
I had difficulty with coding a few of these programs, described below...
for (int i=8; i>0; i--)
On this line, it says “i>=0”.
This allows the code to get to array member 0. Before, the code just said “i>0”, so array member never turned off. Array member 2 was defined as Input 2 in the array, so the LED connected to Input 2 was the one that did not shut off.
Now that it says “i>=0”, Input 2 is included in the instructions of code and will now turn off.