Any home electronics hobbyists here - where to get breadboards?

danlightbulb · 17 May 2020 at 18:41

Hi all.

Hoping this is the right section for amateur home electronics hobbyists.

Ive been watching some basic electronics videos on youtube, making logic gates etc with transistors and want to have a go.

But the videos I watched (a guy called Ben Eater on youtube) did a short video about breadboards and warned about cheap poor quality boards, the difference between poor and good being only a few dollars.

So I looked on the rainforest and all the boards for sale have pretty bad reviews. Where can I get some good quality breadboards from, and also some packs of basic electronic components? Ive seen there are 'starter kits' for sale but I'd rather buy separate items of better quality than cheap junk in a kit.

Thanks

picnic · 18 May 2020 at 08:11

You could have a look at Farnell or RS Components

Frozennova · 18 May 2020 at 08:17

As picnic said, Farnell/Element14 and RS Components. Places like Pimonri stock lots of kit type stuff suited to messing with Arduinos and Pis

I've also bought stuff from RobotShop in the past too

Caged · 18 May 2020 at 18:19

Rapid Electronics have a load of the prototyping/education type stuff

Rroff · 18 May 2020 at 18:27

If you mean breadboard (non-solder) rather than prototype PCB board I've used various cheaper bits off Amazon from SunFounder and sourcingmap for quick prototyping without issue - though that has mostly been quick testing stuff so no idea how they stack up for longer term use.

kingteeb · 2 Jul 2020 at 17:13

Can vouch for RS Components

SonicSW20 · 2 Jul 2020 at 17:14

Caged said:
Rapid Electronics have a load of the prototyping/education type stuff

Used to live near them, were always very helpful

EMarkM · 2 Jul 2020 at 18:01

Caged said:
Rapid Electronics have a load of the prototyping/education type stuff

Can vouch for Rapid.

No connection to them (hur hur electrical joke...ahem) other than being a satisfied customer when we buy their kits to use on amateur radio training courses.

Darg · 5 Jul 2020 at 17:02

If it's just the non-solder ones, the push in ones I've used ones from Amazon and ebay, no issues with them whatsoever, never had a poor connection.

Demon · 8 Jul 2020 at 16:58

I'd still stick with soldered prototype board, it takes a few minutes more, but it's so much more robust.. but if you have to, get the RS ones, they feel so much more well made, heavier, more resistance on the contacts etc, the cheapo ELEGOO ones from the usual places are cheap junk..

bjmnz · 16 Jul 2020 at 09:41

As others have said, Rapid, RS, Farnell, and also CPC (I think they're still part of Farnell).

If it helps, I looked into good quality breadboards a few years back and ended up with a Wisher WBU-206+J. I think the options were the plastic material and round/square hole. I ended up with POM (rather than ABS) and square. My emails say I got it from CPC back in 2016, but it looks like they don't sell them anymore for some reason.

You can buy male/male, male/female flexible jumper leads from ebay very cheaply, they are listed as 'Dupont cables', but some of the crimps can be questionable. I think I may have even bought just the connectors at some point intending to make up my own leads just so I could be sure the connections were good.