I am sucking at this breadboard thing. Those who use em, some advice please

[stopstopsmile]

Hey guys,
I dabbled with a breadboard and I just don't quite grasp it.  I have read online as much as I could find and figured that I would be ready to go but I seem to keep having bugs in my circuits and circuits that don't work.  I just don't understand the breadboard, I thought I did.

I know this is total NOOB, and something that is easy for most.  But for me I am having a hard time with it.

I was hoping someone could give me an explanation of how it all works, how they use it, etc.  Basically a refresher.

I am erasing my knowledge of it, going to take a nap, and try again later today.  So I was hoping for a fresh start.

Any tips, pointers, guides, info, anything to help me get this working would be fantastic and greatly appreciated.

thanks guys

[Auke Haarsma]

A simple search with "How to use breadboard" resulted in this thread:

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=59855.0

Which covers pretty much what you need to know I think.

Good luck! Once you understand a bb it is a really nice tool to work with!

[gez]

When I first bought a bread board it took a while for me to understand how it worked, so you're not alone!  Stick with it: a little time spent familiarising yourself with it now will save you hours of time/headaches in the future. 

With the breadboards I use, there are breaks in the 'ground buses' (the red/black coloured power-rails that connect the various segments of the board).  I didn't realise this at first, until I cracked open my DMM to find out why I wasn't getting power to my circuits.  What was required were jumpers between each section.  Something to bear in mind.

[8mileshigh]

Start by breadboarding a very simple booster circuit, and move on to tougher things.  I tried to breadboard the Kay Fuzztone last week and gave up, I was all over the place so decided just to perf it instead, was much faster.

Chris

[Dragonfly]

This project is a VERY good way to learn about using a breadboard. Its a OD250 laid out and set up on a breadboard, step by step....

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?board=33.0

[nebucanazza]

What I like to do is:

As soon as I get a breadboard, I use 4 small wires to jumper the 4 long rails. I also like to run two long wires across the board to connect the rails. So you get  2 +9V and 2 ground
buses by connecting your battery leads to any of two rails. You can also use a pen to mark +9V and ground and use that all the time.

[frankclarke]

If you have a resistance meter, it is worth using it to figure out what is connected to what. Once you get it working, there is a form of stripboard with an empty strip down the middle, so you can copy your test circuit onto the permanent version using the same layout.

[Shepherd]

Sometimes the terminals are bad from the start.  If you find yourself struggling to cram a 1n914 into one of those slots it is probably not a good slot.

[nebucanazza]

I have also found that most of the errors are due to loose components/components plugged into the wrong hole( both very likely). An easy way to debug would be to take the hot wire of the output jack and check the signal at all suspect points from beginning to end. This technique has been really handy for me, enabling me to find out multiple errors in large 5 FET circuits in a matter of minutes.