SILICON CHIP
Publisher & Editor-in-Chief
Leo Simpson, B.Bus.
Editor
Greg Swain, B.Sc.(Hons.)
Technical Staff
John Clarke, B.E.(Elec.)
Robert Flynn
Advertising Manager
Paul Buchtmann (02) 982 9553
Regular Contributors
Neville Williams, FIREE, VK2XV
Bryan Maher, M.E. B.Sc.
Jim Yalden, VK2YGY
Garry Cratt, VK2YBX
Jim Lawler, MTETIA
John Hill
Jennifer Bonnitcha, B.A.
Photography
Bob Donaldson
Editorial Advisory Panel
Philip Watson, MIREE, VK2ZPW
Norman Marks
Steve Payor, B.Sc., B.E.
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ISSN 1030-2662
2
SILICON CHIP
PUBLISHER'S u·1-1ER
Electronics for Everyone
- anyone can learn
This month I want to talk about our on-going series "Electronics for
Everyone". We started this series in our March issue and I did not
have a chance in that issue to introduce it. The thinking behind the
"Electronics for Everyone" series is that there are plenty of textbooks
and magazine articles where you can read about the basic theory of
electronics. By contrast, this series is intended to be entirely practical.
Many people get quite a good grounding in electronics by taking a
technical college course or a correspondence course but when it
comes to doing something practical they feel a bit lost. Then again,
there are many people who want to get stuck right into the practical
side of electronics without bothering too much about the theory side.
Having spent more than my share of time hunched over textbooks, I
can well understand that. The practical side is more fun.
So to cater for this need to explain the practical side, we have
started the series "Electronics for Everyone". In each episode we'll explain how you can recognise the different types of components and the
jargon associated with them. So far, we've had episodes on resistors
[March 1989), plastic and ceramic capacitors (April), electrolytic
capacitors [May), potentiometers and trimpots [September) and this
month, switches.
One of the difficult aspects of writing the series is that it is hard to
focus on what is confusing to a beginner. When you have been writing
about electronics for more than 20 years, it is very easy to forget what
was puzzling when you started out. To overcome this problem we try
to have people who are just becoming involved in electronics read
each episode. Even so, after each episode is printed it sometimes
becomes obvious that there are some aspects we have missed or
possibly not explained as well as they should be.
For example, when we had finished the article on capacitor coding
in the April issue we thought that we had the subject pretty well
covered. Then we came across some capacitors with the value given
according to the IEC code, such as 680n for .68µF, but with the
tolerance as given by the EIA code, with G for 2%. We think that this
mixing up of codes by the manufacturers makes it very confusing.
You can help us with the future presentation of episodes of "Electronics for Everyone" by writing and suggesting topics to be covered.
Perhaps you are a beginner in electronics and want a number of
aspects explained. Don't be afraid to ask. Everyone has to start where
you are now. Perhaps you have considerable experience but can
recall some aspects of electronics which were confusing to you. Either
way, you can help make the series as comprehensive as possible.
Leo Simpson