Best electronics to salvage parts from

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KissMyRobot

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I got the, probably terrible, idea of building some distortion pedals from transistors and opamps salvaged from older electronics.

What devices do you think would have some goodies? I was thinking some old boomboxes or VCRs. Things I could find in a thrift store.

Has anyone done anything similar?
 
KissMyRobot said:
I got the, probably terrible, idea of building some distortion pedals from transistors and opamps salvaged from older electronics.

What devices do you think would have some goodies? I was thinking some old boomboxes or VCRs. Things I could find in a thrift store.

Has anyone done anything similar?
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So much consumer electronics has been made using SMTechnology for so long now that you will find little that is useful I fear!

To get started I suggest first the purchase of a good digital multimeter, spend £50/$80? Then buy some lucky bags of components, Rs C's and transistors. The chips are pretty cheap anyway and all you really need for pedals are a few TL072s.

Dave.
 
+1. The only thing I've ever salvaged is transformers, and once a complete power supply. Otherwise, even if you found something with discrete components, like an old TV (real old) I thihk it'd be more trouble than it is worth to extract parts, you'd have resistors with too short leads, etc etc.

Not sure where you are located, but those radio shack universal pc boards come in handy too.
 
But! Old gear like VCRs, DVD players can be a good source of wire.

Basic I know but interconnecting wire is often forgotten. Us Old Halnds have so much electronic crap about the place that we forget that the beginner might struggle to find some differently coloured wires to link up a project.....And DO use different and consistent wiring! DC neg black, pos red, 0V (split supply) green then work up you own system for other connections. Makes fault tracing SO much easier and you will do a LOT of fault tracing!

Dave.
 
I'd like to hear other people's thoughts on this too... I recycled an old Dell machine and found some heat sinks and other components... plus, I have other electronic 'junk' that could be recycled as well. But, I'm wondering what's worth saving.
 
I wouldnt bother salvaging with the low cost of componants these days versus potentially frying parts while your salvaging.
Parts like capacitors (elecrolytics) have a limited life too and you will be dissapointed if you build something and end up spending hours debugging and still cant find the problem because its a fried transistor/ capacitor/ resistor.

I've been at it for a year now and it gets a whole lot easier the more you learn.
Sure its a steep learning curve for a start even just reading schematics and build docs.
I reccomend you start small (fuzz or some such) and progressively build on your experiances.
I'm currantly having a run on envelope filters and auto wahs.
Its great fun. Enjoy.
 
we have a surplus salvage place around here, I go in and walk out with a bag full of resistors, caps, transitors, tubes, whatever, five bucks.
 
For the kind of thing you need you'd be better just buying, but if you happen to have old transistor radios knocking around they could be a good source of transistors.
 
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