I'm a librarian learning Arduino with the goal being to create a youth program for disadvantaged pre-teens and teens.
Howerver, I am having a lot of trouble with Arduino components. It's too the point of getting frustrated with the entire project; I'm ready to look for another starter kit.
The problem is the hardware more than the coding. The instructions could be more explicit in putting things together, but I've been able to follow the directions for the physical and coding parts. But putting the breadboard together seems to be much harder than it should be.
In general, the wire sizes don't quite match the illustrations.
On project 2 (Spaceship Interface), the resistors are too "tall" for the card cover to sit flush against the breadboard. I considered trimming them, but finally bent them. Then, the LEDs were too "short" to stick out the cover! I ended up having to create a spaceship interface cover with shorter folds, so it would fit over the breadbox, but the LEDs would come through.
On project 4 (Light Mixing Lamp), I had so much trouble with the gels. They barely fit into the wood parts, and that's if the wood doesn't slight down the photosensor leads! The slightest movement sets them flying across the room. But I finally got it all together, wrote the code, checked, plugged it in and ran it...nothing.
After some playing around, I noticed that when moving the ground (black) wire--which already has a lot of wiggle room--the LED does flash on, then off. It happens during the movement to connect the pin to the board; once in, nothing happens.
Any thoughts?
See my setup here: Project Troubles Color Mixing Lamp - Album on Imgur
First photo is the setup, second photo is my attempt to get the light to flash on as I put in the ground wire. It flashed just before I took the photo; you can see the pin is not "in."
***EDIT: Please check me if this solution is correct. The instructions have the phototransistors backwards. The instructions say that "attach the long end of each photo transistor to power. On the other side [meaning the shorter end], attach a 10k ohm resistor to ground."
I took this to mean that the long piece should be placed on the F column of the breadbox, on the side where a small red wire connects to the positive column (and thus the 5V), while the shorter side should be placed in the E column, the side of the breadbox that has the resistor.
HOWEVER, this project only works when the instructions are reversed. The long side of the phototransistor needs to be in E, on the same row with the resistors; the short side needs to be in F which has the connection to power.
Are the instructions incorrect? Is this fix (turning the photo transistor opposite) correct? Or am I missing something?