Arduino Do-It-Yourself Soldering KIT available?

Hi,

Is there anywhere a Arduino KIT that one can use to lern to solder components (before starting programming)? THT or SMT components would be fine. Distributors cound not help. We would like to have it as a project for our apprentice.

Thank you!

There is the 8x8 dot LED display kits which are simple and require a little through hole soldering. They have a MAX7219 on them. We don't have any at the moment but they work. (If wired up correctly)

You can pick up the self solder 8x8 matrix kits on ebay (one of several suppliers) and loads of other types of kit. They also have SMT training boards.

Another place to look is Vellerman kits as they do some nice/useful things.

When learning soldering, it is easy to do harm to the PCB and chip (especially those with many pins), so I think you have to prepare a lot of arduino PCBs and components. How about download the Arduino Uno PCB and use some PCB Prototyping services to manufacture a lot of that? Of course, you have to buy components too, but I think that would be cheaper than solder kits.

Thank you folks for the hints,

Actually the apprentice is practising with 0402 components and the results look reasonable. So it will not cost too many PCB...
I just thought one of the Arduinos could be a good starting point to build on, to have at the end something impressive (hardware including shields, µC firmware, software) completely self-made.

@CrossRoads sells a nice kit for an ATmega1284 based Arduino compatible-ish board. I have one and am comfortable highly recommending it.

Actually the apprentice is practising with 0402 components

Soldering by hand?

Hi dannable,

Yes, since my job is in an EMS we are replacing 0402 by hand if necessary (for elder person like me with microscope of course) but I have to confess: 0201 is the limit so far and: no caffeine before, else you might scratch an ECG into the board! :wink:

To Coding Badly: Thank you for the hint!

I have done a few of these and agree Crossroads boards are great.
http://www.crossroadsfencing.com/BobuinoRev17/