How do you guys organize your components?

[MattAnonymous]

Just out of curiosity, how does everyone organize his components?  I'm a sucker for grab bags which, usually, have multiples of uncommon parts, misc resistors and caps, etc.  I have a couple of clear plastic bins that I'm currently using, but I have so many different parts that it's getting hard to organize them.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Matt

[vanhansen]

At some point I'm plaining on getting one of those vertical drawer bins from Home Depot or Lowes and using that.  I have one now full of nuts and bolts in the garage.  One for my parts would be perfect.  A couple maybe.  Right now though they are just split out by type, resistors, caps, ICs, transistors and JFETS, and one box of pots, jacks, stompswitches and such.

[MartyMart]

I have two sets of small steel drawers, which hold up my desk.
Some have clear plastic "vertical" boxes inside with divisions.
Great for putting caps/pots/jacks together inside and easy to access.
The rest of the drawers hold cable/tools/veroboard etc.
Its about as "organized" as I can get !!

Marty.

[nelson]

I made my own little compartment box out of a couple of cardboard boxes and some duct tape. That way I can get the compartments to the size I want, just hope it doesnt get wet.......

[David]

Um, um, I...  don't.

I have an organizer drawer.  Really.  I just have to gather up and organize all my scattered parts and put them in there.  To do that, though, I have to stop building.  Even though I'm slow, I just can't quite seem...  to...  stop...

[The Tone God]

More then ten 5x7 plastic drawer stacks. I pair most of them up for various parts. For example for my newer resistors I put two stacks together labeling the top 1-9  horizontally for each column of drawers and vertically for each row of drawers (1, 10, 100, 1K, 10K, 100K, 1M). So to find a resistor of a particular value I just look for the right mangnatude then the value. Much faster and organized. Makes it easier to keep things clean too.

Andrew

[StephenGiles]

4 Crawfords biscuit tins - and the biscuits were great!
Stephen

[Johnny G]

i have a clear plastic multi compartment thingamy which i keep all my carbon resistors in (sorted by value from smallest to largest with a seperate compartment for all multiples of 10) and then a set of 4 cardboard drawers.

bottom draw is resistor box and coils of wire. next drawer up is other resistors, metal film, potentiometers etc. then its capacitors and semiconductors in one draw and the top drawer is for misc parts (jacks, battery clips) and is also a project graveyard.

theres also a red plastic box which holds larger misc stuff, currentlly theres a strat pickgaurd in there, a set of tuners as well as a couple of transformers ripped from other places.

[jmusser]

I just went through that the other day. I had the stuff stashed in Tupperware containers, plastic shopping bags,zip locks,etc. My wife suggested strongly :wink: that I get my mess cleaned up, so I went to Walley World, and got myself a couple of those clear plastic drawer organizer cabinets, tiny plastic bags, and several sizes of paper labels. They had small drawers in the top half and double size drawers in the bottom. For all of my pico caps for example, each value went into individual, small, craft, ziplocks bags, 1 1/2"X 2 1/2" and got labeled. Other things went into the small drawers with dividers, but the contents were labeled on the end. This must have taken me 10 straight hours, but it's been WELL worth the time. I've also been a good boy, and put each new order into the organizer drawers as they came in. I'm a clutterer by nature, but it's getting to the point now that I'm thinking my wife may have been right all along (29 years) about this organization thing

[Johan]

..eh..from what I understand, there are three basic systems of order..

American: everything on top..
Chinese: everything on the floor..
Biblical: search and you will find..

...I do a combination....everything on top, on the floor..search and you will find...
..ok, maby not THAT bad, but I think most people would consider me unorganised...but my tools are collorcoded and I doo find everything when I need them/it..

Johan

[mat]

I use these for the smaller parts:

http://tinypic.com/4jkzll

mat

[petemoore]

Fishing tackle box tops [th segmented 2'' seciontals] for transistor types.
 I cut the bottom 3''s off cheerios boxes, many of them, these get stacked/placed in:
 16'' by 30'' by 16'' cardboard boxes, I cut the 'top' sections off and use those to make shelves.
 This system makes for custom 'drawers', and I can just pull the cheerio bottom out, and see alot.
 The 'shelves have the 30'' upright, so I have alot of flat area, and take up less table area.
 My bench is a large door.
 I like having the parts sort of flat, if It gets to where they're 'stacking' I start another box, I find having them spread out makes it much easier to view them.

[ESPguitar]

I use these for the smaller parts:

http://tinypic.com/4jkzll

mat

Maaan, that was what i call system (but, ofcourse you need that with so many of each part)

How many of you guys have so many part lying around?

RB

[NaBo]

After reading this thread, and damn near crapping myself, I decided not to store my ICs and trannies neatly organized by type in those little plastic compartmentalized containers, or keeping ALL parts for upcoming projects in ziploc baggies.

So as it stands right now:

Ziploc baggies: jumble of resistors, mess of caps, switches, knobs, pots, jacks, heat sinks
Plastic containers: sockets, diodes & LDRs, hardware/grommets/metal standoffs/misc. junk
Antistatic bags: ICs, transistors/voltage reg's

Hopefully I'm safe til I can have a nice static-protected wall of tiny drawers.

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

Those 12 compartment tackle boxes do it for me, particularly for mechanical shit. Because, you can stack a lot of them on top of each other in shelves, pull them out & see wht is in them without opening them.
Plus it means you have 4 or so boxes & that is all the caps easy to get at for prototyping, for example.I get matching tackle boxes with 18, 12 and 1 compartment, the undivided ones are great for putting prototypes and 'work in priogress' in, along wiht notes. Also, delicate cables like testleads are best coiled up in these.
Chips either in foam (if there are only 1 or 2 of a part) otherwise in tubes.
Resistors in the traditional drawers, btu I'm not a drawer fan, they use up a lot of wall space. With the tackle boxes, I get over 100 compartments per square foot of wall.

[jmusser]

I usually keep the chips in their anti static bags, or on their "Backs" so they won't get static damage. I take the bags and tape them up, so that the part number is up, and put them in their drawers that way. I get some that are in the black anti-static foam, and I leave them in that in the drawer.  So far, it seems like op amps are almost immune from static, but the more logic style(especially 4070s) can't stand handling.

[Gladmarr]

...as you can see, I don't organize anything!!!

[NaBo]

... *wonders what's in the mustard bottle*  :? ... ... ... ...  :idea:!!!  mustard?  

[Gladmarr]

MOJO!!    :twisted:

[Paul Marossy]

I use these bins that I bought at Lowe's. (I also use a pair of those 3-drawer storage thingies that you can buy at Walmart - they're approx. 30" tall, 36" wide and 30" deep. They hold my amp building stuff and some other miscellaneous items like virgin amp chassis, etc.)



And here is where I keep most of my tools:



When I first started doing this stuff, I was using a tacklebox.