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Hello Arduino Members. I am new And i just joined the forums. well ima a guy who like to tinker with electronics and components even though I don't know much. So when I heard about Arduino I decided to check the site out and do some research on what Arduino is. So what easy projects can I make and what components do i need and what Arduino should I get?

Best Regards,
Andy

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Welcome -- you are among like-minded individuals here!

There are 1000s of places to start, but let me recommend that you spend some time looking through the forums and examples on this site.

Grab a copy of "Getting Started with Arduino," and jump right in!

Another excellent place to start is with the "Arduino Cookbook."

Pat.

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also popular is - http://www.earthshineelectronics.com/files/ASKManualRev5.pdf -

or the books of Simon Monk (also a member on this forum)

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Might as well use this thread to try and introduce myself, although I'm having major trouble with the site today.
I don't think it's just me as isup.me says arduino.cc is down to. I either get timeouts or 10 second+ page load times.

Anyway, Hello, I'm Jon, based in mid-Wales, interested in making products for people with visual impairments.

I had a great training course recently at BCA in Birmingham with Arduino-evangelist Garry Bulmer who was running an excellent one-day course.

I was so enthused I bought an Arduino Uno kit on the spot and was chuffed when, two evenings later with nothing more than the Uno, 1 switch, 1 resistor, 1 speaker and 3 bits of wire, I had the Uno saying "ready" and then "button up" or "button down" depending on the state.

Having never done MCU fiddling before, and my programming knowledge limited to PHP, I was quite pleased. Next project is to see if I can make a light activated chicken-run door opener for under £20 using one of those £10 Mini Light's.

Things I want to do to start with to get going before the “proper” stuff...

  • Make a kitchen countdown timer that rings a little handbell for a few seconds.
  • Make a chicken door opener. Both for under £10 each.

Eventually I want to....

  • Build a data logger which will intercept and log the NIBE heat pump status and running time data from the external F2015 unit to the SMO 05 controller which runs on a CAT5 cable (once I’ve found out the data protocol!).

  • Interface with the IR interface “eye” of my electricity meter and log hourly readings of the actual energy usage (as opposed to the highly inaccurate but cheap clamp-the-wire monitors).

In fact, it turns out someone's already doing an Arduino project for the latter! Well, I'm here, I'm learning, I hope I can contribute one day.

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based in mid-Wales

Welcome Jon,
Wales is great, been there twice, (too) long ago.
Visited a.o. Brecon, Gower, Devils Bridge and GlanFairPG (even bought a tape to learn to pronounce it :slight_smile:

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Welcome to ArduinoLand! :slight_smile:

Sometimes the forum/site can slow to a crawl, you just have to wait while someone cranks the handle on the server. :wink: