Radio Shack Parts... what is the Quality?

[petemoore]

  Yeap, we made the mistake of investing in cables hardware.
Barely better than making connections using dirt., we worked with the junk for a good while.
  wires always breaking, connections and plugs getting 'loose' all the times...ughhhm, great for solid learning exp., we used to see that kind laying around peoples junk boxes.
  but at that time also...we found out about getting a roll of Belden shielded cable  , and switchcraft plugs..very nice..I still have, and use some of those.

[Hamfist]

I like their LED bezels with the rubber plug.  Other than that, I only buy stuff like solder and battery snaps there because that's the kind of stuff I always forget to order elsewhere.  Plus I had the absolute WORST experience at one of their stores that I've EVER had in ANY retail store.  So I typically avoid them. 

The manager at one RS in town is a pretty cool guy though.  He said he used to build effects a long time ago.  And he acknowledged that it's unfortunate that hardly anyone builds/repairs anything anymore, and that RS is not the place to buy parts for projects and such.   

[joegagan]

i agree with doug h. the plugs, cords, wire, jacks are such poor quality, no matter how well you try and put things together you still end up with a very unreliable product. bad news.

they actually have some mouser quality batt snaps tho.

[Boogdish]

I like their aluminum project enclosures.  I buy my solder there because I never think ahead and am always buying it at the last minute.

[DougH]

I use their 63/37 solder because I've been too lazy to order a big roll. Also have used their LED bezels and IC sockets with good results.

[trendyironicname]

I lucked out and one went out of business or something around here and one of the area "yard sale" stores bought up their entire stock and sold everything at an increasing percentage markdown every week.  I lucked out and wound up getting like 4 breadboards, a couple hundred feet of stranded and solid core wire, some solder, solder braid, and a whole lot of random comps for like 20 dollars.  It seriously was like christmas.

I wish they still did the aluminum boxes.  Not great looking but I liked putting my microprocessor projects in em over these cheap plastic ones. 




I gotta see about going to the vet if my rats keep it up.  They broke out of their cage and some how lifted the lid to my humidor.  I came home to find a completely shreded Don Rafael in their cage and them hyped up on nicotine.  Not sure how much to worry yet. I'm weird.

[m-theory]

I don't think you can make a blanket statement about all of their jacks, plugs, tools, etc. like you used to be able to.  I was snooping in the drawers there one day and stumbled across a switchcraft XLR (probably a fluke, but it was sealed in a RS package), and the hand tools aren't THAT bad anymore.  They're at least as good as anyone else's consumer tool offerings...not snap-on or mac, but no longer the total bend-o-matic crapola that used to be branded RS. 

Still, it's true that, by and large, nothing that they carry is really what you'd be looking for if you were building pro quality anything, which is sort of the whole theme of this thread.  They're a retail consumer store with a tiny fraction of their floor space aimed towards novice builders who either don't know any better, or need something in a pinch.  I've never considered the store as a serious, pro-level outlet, from the moment I first started shopping for parts for my Craig Anderton kits back in the late 70's. 

[oldrocker]

I will lose respect from everyone here for writing this but here it goes.  You are right in most comments about RS.   I would have to say though that I wouldn't be building pedals if it wasn't for all the Radio Shacks in my area.  In the beginning if I couldn't get the parts from RS then I would build something else.  Heck I didn't know no better.  Yes they are expensive and their IC sockets are much to be desired but other than that I haven't had too many problems with the components I've bought from there.  When I first started building I was building mostly distortion pedals and boosters.  With that small parts count it was easy to head down the road and pick up what I needed.  And believe it or not after I started emptying their bins, to my surprise they started re-stocking the last few times I went there. 
I'm also impatient when it comes to waiting for shipments so if I can pick up a pot or cap there instead of waiting for UPS or FED EX to show up I'll do it.  If I'm buying in bulk though nothing beats ordering on-line, but for beginners that just need a few easy to get parts RS can be very convenient. 
And now for some reason I have this tremendous urge to go wash my hands.

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

Can't argue with that Oldrocker.
though I have searched for discarded TVs on the street rather than go to RS (Tandy as it is here in Australia).
Just so long as people know what the alternatives are.
So far as quality is concerned - RS has much better QUALITY than VARIETY.

[CodeMonk]

For me its either RS or take a 60-70 mile drive to a place called Sandy's Electronics.
Not the best stocked place, but far better than RS as far as what they stock, and their prices are a little bit better (EX: 1/4 jacks are $1.25 vs $2.99 at RS).
Hell, for me, to even get to the nearest RS is about a 30 mile drive.

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

CodeMonk, if that's the Sandy's in Reno, tell them they have a crap website!

[Meanderthal]

 It seemed to me like one day they had Moogs and passive crossovers and motorola bullet tweeters and cool stuff like that, and the next day they didn't. I know it was a slow degeneration, but it reminds me of the first time I walked into a record store and they had no(vinyl) records.

[spaceace76]

Well, as a RS employee, I guess this thread should be my first post.

I have about zero stock in our parts as far as quality is concerned. Every once in a while I come across something that appears to be of good quality, but very rarely. Actually, there is this one roll of wire we sell now that has a thick plastic coating over it. I replaced some wire with this new stuff, seemed to keep out noise fairly well.

I only use our stuff for, I guess "prototyping" (I've built like one pedal so I'm not sure if this word totally fits) and then order from either mouser or smallbear. Then I rebuild everything with the good stuff once I know what mistakes I will make when building, and hopefully I can avoid them the second time around. I'm the type of person that, when I mess something up, I mess it up big time. I was fiddling with the transistors in my wah, and fried them, not to mention messed up the board etchant. Eventually I got it working again, but I had to be patient and make sure I wasn't making things worse again. So using our stuff helps me build better, but I don't use our parts in the end product. This approach is pretty helpful for those times when I get a bit reckless, usually after staying up and tweaking till the wee hours of the night.

The 30% discount doesn't hurt much, either 

As far as the competence of our staff, yeah, it's bad. I don't know a lot about electronics, I do this DIY thing as a means to good tone, so obviously my knowledge is limited to the components and practices of guitar/pedal construction. I'm no electrical engineer, but I know my way around the drawers in my store. Unfortunately, no one else in my store, or many of the other stores which I've been sent to work knows a damn thing about the components we sell. This is one of those things that makes my job a bit hard to deal with. I'm surprised I don't get phone calls in the middle of the day when a customer needs help with an electronics question, but knows slightly less about it than I do, and (of course) more than any associate present. But, meh, I'm still young and I doubt $400 every two weeks is really worth putting in so much worry. 

So, to formally answer the question posed by this thread, Associating RS parts with quality is like associating a hemorrhage with an ice cream cone. You probably could, but, would you really want to?

[Jered]

  I think of RS parts and components the same as I do Harbor Freight tools. If you need it to work once,...it might,...maybe. If you need it to work twice, don't buy from either place.
  Now before I get blasted from someone telling me they have this or that that has worked for a year. I'm sure you do. But if you buy anything from either place and expect it to work more than once, your a fool. Just my .02
  Jered

[8mileshigh]

I buy the RS resistor packs and take what I need for different projects, they're very handy and do the job nicely dispite having thinner wire than the resistors I buy at the electronic store.  I have also bought a selection of audio taper pots for $ 0.98 which was a decent price but the prize of my last visit on Saturday was the EXP 300 breadboard I also got for $0.98 !!   Can't go wrong with that.

In the early 80's, I went to RS with a schematic to build a light meter for exposing infared film. I was greeted by a helpful salesman that fixed me up with all of the components including the photocell in record time.  It was a good experience so I understand why some of you guys have fond memories of Radio Shack.  The place rocked back in the day.

CD

[DougH]

There is something to be said for convenience. The surplus place was out of 100k 1/2W's the other day so I stopped at RS and picked up a couple packs. A carbon film resistor is a carbon film resistor AFAIC. Nothing wrong with the alpha pots at RS either if you don't mind the price or sawing the shafts. As a general rule I don't use RS too much but it will do in a pinch, depending on what it is I need. I get 99% of what I need at the surplus store. The rest I usually get from Steve, Mouser or any of the usual places. I don't like waiting on the mail, or for online transactions to complete, etc though. It's worth a lot to me to be able to grab something off the shelf and take it home. I don't believe much in parts/brand mojo either. I've built some really nice sounding stuff with potpourri - whatever was available on the particular day that I shopped.

I feel for spaceace76. I think RS is fundamentally confused about what their business really is. It must be a confusing place to work. We used to have a franchise store in town with a guy that was passionate about electronics, knew his stuff and was really helpful. Those days are gone...