Elenco 130-in-1 Electronics Playground User Manual

ELENCO®150 Carpenter AvenueWheeling, IL 60090(847) 541-3800Website: www.elenco.come-mail: [email protected] © 2012, 2009 by Elenco®Electro

-151--10-SUGGESTIONS TO HELPKeep a NotebookAs you’re about to find out, you are going to learnmany things about electronics by using this kit. As youl

-100-You’ve built many circuits using the operationalamplifier, but there are lots of other ways to use thishandy IC. One of them is the single flashm

-101-Now you are going to use the operational amplifieras a comparator and as a Schmitt trigger circuit. Aslong as its input voltage exceeds a certain

-102-The digital LED can’t display all 26 letters of thealphabet, but it’s possible to exhibit many of them.Let’s make an LED display that intersperse

-103-You know that digital circuits produce low or high (Lor H) outputs (0 or 1). Now you’re going to create alogic tester that shows 1 for high level

-104-A microphone can be used to detect sound. Here youwill make a circuit that lights the LED when themicrophone detects sound, using the speaker as

-105-The operational amplifier (op amp) works well as anoscillator. In this experiment, you will build an electricbuzzer that makes a continuous beep.

-106-The electronic buzzer we built in the previous circuitcan only make a continuous beep, but we can makea similar circuit that produces various sir

-107-Here’s another siren that alters its pitch. The siren webuilt in our last experiment alters pitch from low tohigh, but this one alters its pitch

-108-The sirens in Projects 88 and 89 (“Sweep Oscillator”and “Falling Bomb”, respectively) adjust the pitchonly in one direction. This circuit makes a

-109-This siren gives off alternating high and low sounds.Slide the switch to position B and construct thecircuit. After you complete the wiring and s

-11-I. PLAYGROUND OF ELECTRONIC CIRCUITS-150-This oscillator circuit produces a sine wave signal. Asine wave (or sinusoid) is a wave of pure single-fr

-110-This is the operational amplifier version of theelectronic metronome from Project 3 (“ElectronicMetronome”). Slide the switch to position B, andc

-111-This burglar alarm makes a buzzing sound whenanyone sneaking into your house trips over a wireand breaks it off or disconnects it from a terminal

Do you sleep late? Even if you do, don’t fear!Because you can make the siren in this circuit alarmso that wakes you up gradually as the day dawns.Set

-113-Want to create an amplifier that mixes two tonestogether? There are many different types of tonemixing circuits, but the operational amplifier is

-114-Now you are going to produce a loud sound bycombining an operational amplifier with twotransistors. After you finish the wiring, set the switchto

-115-VCO? What’s that? VCO stands for voltagecontrolled oscillator, and as the name implies, thisoscillator changes its oscillation frequency accordin

-116-IX. MORE FUN WITH OPERATIONAL AMPLIFIERS

-117-In this experiment, you will create a voice input powermeter. The brightness of the LED in this circuitchanges according to the level of voice in

-118-Do you know what a reset circuit does? It activatesother circuits and detects any power fluctuations inorder to prevent malfunctions. In this exp

-119-This circuit is a delayed timer that uses anoperational amplifier and the RC time constant. RCstands for resistor/capacitor. A circuit that delay

-149--12-Transistors are very important, and you may need totest them to be sure they are working. You can’t tell ifone is working just by looking at

-120-The circuit in this experiment allows you to hearalternating current. You probably know that theelectric power running through your home is analt

-121-This is a pulse frequency multiplier with onetransistor. It doubles the frequency of the input signal,so it is also called a pulse frequency dou

-122-White noise is a noise that has a wide frequencyrange. One kind of white noise is the static noise youhear when you tune your FM radio to an area

-123-This circuit changes the intervals between eachsound according to the amount of light falling on theCdS cell. The sound changes continuously as y

-124-Here’s a DC-DC converter circuit; it can make 5VDCfrom 3VDC. Assemble the experiment, set the switchto position A, and see how this circuit works

-125-This circuit produces light and sound when it detectsyour voice or any other sound. The earphone acts asa microphone. IC 1 amplifies sounds picke

-126-Who says an operational amplifier (op amp) can’t beused to make a digital circuit? Here, you will use oneto make an AND gate. The LED display is

-127-Here’s a timer you can use for taking timed tests orsimply for knowing when an amount of time haspassed. You can preset this timer for up toappro

-128-Wouldn’t you like to make a kitchen timer that you canuse for cooking meals? This circuit gives out a buzzersound for 1 to 2 seconds and automati

-129-X. RADIO AND COMMUNICATION CIRCUITS

-148--13-Here is the first siren you are going to do – don’t beshocked if this experiment becomes the most famouscircuit in this kit.This siren sounds

-130-In emergency situations when there is no power, agermanium diode radio can be used. Generally theydo not perform well and limited to using and cr

-131-This circuit is a simplified but effective code transmittersimilar the kind used by military and amateur radiooperators around the world. As the

-132-This AM radio station circuit lets you actually transmityour voice through the air. When you completed wiring the circuit, tune your AMradio a we

-133-The crystal radio is one of the oldest and simplestradio circuits, which most people in electronics haveexperimented with. In the days before va

-134-This radio circuit uses two-transistor receiver withenough gain (amplification) to drive the speaker.These simple radios require a good antenna a

-135-Do you want to become an amateur radio ham?Many radio operators started out using an oscillatorwith a tone control like this one. Listening to th

-136-XI. TEST AND MEASUREMENT CIRCUITS

-137-This experiment uses the LED and an audio oscillatoralarm to indicate three different levels of water in acontainer. The water is used as a condu

-138-This circuit is a radio transmitter/alarm for monitoringrising water levels such as on rivers, dams, andspillways, and sends alarm signals to a s

-139-This experiment is a simple transistor audio amplifierused as an audio signal tracer. You can use thisamplifier to troubleshoot transistor audio

-147--14-Learning to play a musical instrument? Then youmight find this experiment helpful. This is anelectronic version of the metronome, used by mus

-140-This experiment is a wide band, untuned RF signaltracer. You can use it to check for antenna signalsand find sources of RF noise and interference

-141-Multivibrator oscillators produce square waves, andyou can use square waves as test signals. You shouldbe familiar with multivibrator circuits fr

-142-When you connect the signal from this oscillator toan oscilloscope, it creates a pattern that looks likethe teeth of a saw (as shown below).The s

-143-This circuit emits a sound if the material you arechecking transmits electricity. This is convenient whenyou are looking at wires, terminals, or

-144-This circuit works as a rain detector. This circuit staysoff and draws no current if the resistance between thelong wires is more than about 250k

-145-This experiment demonstrates how a metal detectorworks. When the coil gets close to something that ismade of metal, the oscillator changes in fre

-146-You can use the operational amplifier as acomparator for detecting changes in voltage. In thisexperiment, you are going to use this comparatorfun

-147-This experiment is a pulse-tone oscillator with anadjustable frequency that can obtain a wide range ofnotes. You can play tunes on it that sound

-148-If you use a meter you can find the exact value of aresistance; but when you only want to knowapproximate resistance values, you can use thisresi

-149-Transistors are very important, and you may need totest them to be sure they are working. You can’t tell ifone is working just by looking at it,

-146--15-Does your home lack a grandfather clock? Well notany longer, with this experiment you will make yourown electronic grandfather clock.This cir

-150-This oscillator circuit produces a sine wave signal. Asine wave (or sinusoid) is a wave of pure single-frequency tone. As an example, a 400Hz sin

-151-In this experiment, you build and study a low-distortionsine wave oscillator. Build this experiment after youhave built and studied the previous

-152-The twin-T type audio oscillator is very popular foruse with electronic organs and electronic testequipment because it is very stable.The resisto

-153-INDEXWe’ve added this listing to aid you in findingexperiments and circuits that you might be especiallyinterested in. Many of the experiments ar

-154-LOGIC AND COMPUTER CIRCUITSAND Gate:29, 36, 39, 40Data:47DTL:29, 30, 31, 33, 35Exclusive OR:33, 44Flip-flop:27, 28, 38, 43, 58, 59Inverting:70, 7

-155-PARTS LISTBar Antenna with HolderBattery Box Plastic (2)Capacitors10pF, ceramic disc type100pF, ceramic disc type0.001μF, ceramic disc type0.01μF

-156-DEFINITION OF TERMSACCommon abbreviation foralternating current.Alternating Current A current that is constantlychanging.AM Amplitude modulatio

-157-Electric FieldThe region of electric attractionor repulsion around a constantvoltage. This is usuallyassociated with the dielectric ina capacitor

-158-Ohm’s Law The relationship betweenvoltage, current, and resistance.Ohm, (ΩΩ) The unit of measure forresistance.OscillatorA circuit that uses feed

-159-IDENTIFYING RESISTOR VALUESUse the following information as a guide in properly identifying the value of resistors.BANDSMETRIC UNITS AND CONVERSI

-145--16-Have you ever wanted to make music just by wavingyour hand? Well that is just what you are going to bedoing. How does this magic work? Well,

ELENCO®150 Carpenter AvenueWheeling, IL 60090(847) 541-3800Website: www.elenco.come-mail: [email protected]

-144- -17-This circuit works as a rain detector. This circuit staysoff and draws no current if the resistance between thelong wires is more than about

-143--18-Are you bothered by mice, do you not have amousetrap? You should try this next experiment tohelp you instead—see if the sound of this cat can

-142--19-Did you know that many marine animalscommunicate to each other using sound? I bet youhave heard that dolphins and whales use sound forcommuni

-159--2-TABLE OF CONTENTSBefore We Begin Page 4Installing the Batteries

-141--20-In this experiment you will be creating an oscillatorcircuit that doesn’t make sound using a speaker oran earphone. Instead the circuit will

-140--21-The sounds that you will hear from this circuit willremind you of the music you hear in horror movies.Once you wire the project, use your spe

-139--22-This circuit is what engineers refer to as a “pulseoscillator”. It will make machine gun like sounds.There are many different ways to make os

-138--23-Have you ever tried to steer a bicycle or a motorcyclewith just four fingers? This would be dangerous on areal motorcycle but on electronic v

-137-This circuit produces short pulses. After you closethe key, the LED display shows 1 for a second andthen turns off, even when you keep pressing t

-136-XI. TEST AND MEASUREMENT CIRCUITS-25-With this experiment you may want to be careful notto confuse your neighbors. This experiment soundsas like

-26-II. BASIC ELECTRONICS CIRCUITS-135-Do you want to become an amateur radio ham?Many radio operators started out using an oscillatorwith a tone cont

-134--27-Until now, in addition to the wiring sequences you havehad drawings to help guide you in the wiring connections.The rest of the projects will

-133--28-Ever thought you could use a capacitor to dim alight? Try this project. After you finish the wiring, setthe switch to A. Then the LED segment

-132--29-How about we take a break? This circuit is forentertainment. The numbers 1 and 2 will flash on thedisplay in the circuit. This might remind y

-158-Ohm’s Law The relationship betweenvoltage, current, and resistance.Ohm, (Ω) The unit of measure forresistance.Oscillator A circuit that uses f

-131--30-In this circuit single pulses of high voltage electricenergy are generated by suddenly discharging acharged capacitor through a transformer.

-130--31-There are three connections made on a transistor;one of these (the base) controls the current betweenthe other two connections. The important

-129-X. RADIO AND COMMUNICATION CIRCUITS-32-Some of the handiest items in your kit are thecapacitors. They store electricity, smooth out pulsingelectr

-128- -33-In this experiment you study the switching action oftransistors in turning an LED on. You will be usingtwo different transistors - one of t

-127--34-In this project, you will discover what happens whenyou connect resistors in series and in parallel. Youwill see the LED-1 on the panel flash

-126- -35-A two-transistor amplifier is used in this circuit. In anamplifier, a small signal is used to produce or controla large signal. This circuit

-36-III. LED DISPLAY CIRCUITS-125-This circuit produces light and sound when it detectsyour voice or any other sound. The earphone acts asa microphone

-124- -37-By using the LED display you will see the effect ofelectrical signals. An LED is similar to a normal diodeexcept when current flows through

-123--38-Wire the circuit as shown to connect the 3V supplyto the LED segments and the decimal point (Dp).What numbers and letters do you see displaye

-122- -39-In this project you will see how to turn on an LED byusing a transistor and a CdS cell.Think of the CdS cell as a resistor that changes itsr

-157-Electric Field The region of electric attractionor repulsion around a constantvoltage. This is usuallyassociated with the dielectric ina capacit

-121--40-This project shows how to control the LED displaythrough the use of transistors.This circuit is similar to the one in Project 18(Transistor A

-41-IV. WELCOME TO DIGITAL CIRCUITS-120-The circuit in this experiment allows you to hearalternating current. You probably know that theelectric power

-119--42-What is a flip-flop? It is a kind of circuit that changesback and forth between two states (on and off) atspecific intervals. It flips into

-118--43-Now it is time to step into the world of digital circuitsand learn some basics. A circuit that acts as a switchto turn different components o

-117--44-In this circuit you will first learn about the AND circuit.When all the connections to its terminals are logichigh (receiving voltage), the A

-116-IX. MORE FUN WITH OPERATIONAL AMPLIFIERS-45-This next circuit is a logic OR circuit. Are you able toguess how this circuit may work? Remember tha

-46-You will not be able to find the word NAND in yourdictionary (unless it is a computer or electronicdictionary). This term means inverted or Non-AN

-47-It is easy to determine what the NOR (inverted OR)circuit does now that you have built and learnedabout the NAND (inverted AND) circuit. When eith

-48-If you don’t know what an exclusive OR means, don’tworry. An exclusive OR (abbreviated XOR) circuitprovides a high output only when one or the oth

-49-V. MORE FUN WITH DIGITAL CIRCUITSDo you sleep late? Even if you do, don’t fear!Because you can make the siren in this circuit alarmso that wakes y

-156-DEFINITION OF TERMSAC Common abbreviation foralternating current.Alternating Current A current that is constantlychanging.AM Amplitude modulati

-50-Have you ever wondered what happens once youstart adding digital circuits together, using the outputof one as the input of another? You’ll find o

-51-A circuit that has an output that is the opposite of itsinput is called an inverter. If the output is 0, (low) thenthe input is 1 (high). If the o

-52-By using your kit’s NAND gates, are you able tofigure out how to make an AND gate? To find out let’sexperiment!As you build this circuit, leave th

-53-One of the cool things about the quad two-inputNAND IC is that to make up other logic circuits all wehave to do is combine the four NAND gates. In

-54-R-S does not mean Radio Shack®flip-flop. As wementioned earlier circuits that flip-flop alternatebetween two states. Those who use flip-flop circu

-55-We have been using digital circuits that have twoinputs, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t havemore than the two inputs. Here is a TTL AND gatew

-56-Setting the switch to B blocks the channel from theLED 1 to the LED 2 However, when you set theswitch to A, you will find that LED lights and turn

-57-NAND gates are able to act as electronicguardsmen. If you don’t want a signal to be placedinto input of a circuit, a NAND will make sure that itdo

-58-Try to mark 0 and 1 inputs on the schematic and seeif this circuit comes up at either a 0 or 1 output. Giveit try and don’t peak at the answer.As

-59-If you are thinking that the NAND gate is a trulyversatile circuit, well then your right! This experimentis a toggle flip-flop circuit made by usi

-155-PARTS LISTBar Antenna with HolderBattery Box Plastic (2)Capacitors10pF, ceramic disc type100pF, ceramic disc type0.001μF, ceramic disc type0.01μF

-60-Since we have made up some digital circuits bycombining NAND gates, it makes sense that wemake XOR gates too. This circuit will show you how. Befo

-61-Have you figured out how to make an enable circuitusing an OR gate? Well, if the answer is yes, thenthis is your chance to compare you design to o

-62-It isn’t hard to think of some situations where wemight want to send input data to two or more differentoutputs. This experiment shows how we can

-63-The last experiment you did let you explore how datacould be sent to two or more different outputs. Youcan probably think of situations where we m

-64-VI. MEET TRANSISTOR-TRANSISTOR LOGIC-97-Now you’re going to make a blinking LED circuitusing an operational amplifier. In this experiment, anLED c

-65-Connect terminals 13 and 14 to turn on the powerand finish the wiring sequence for this circuit. You’llnotice that both LED 1 and LED 2 alternate

-66-Listen to the sound this project makes. Take yourtime and check your work because there are a lot ofwiring steps. Once you’ve finished, set the sw

-67-Multivibrator circuits can be created from NANDgates. This experiment is an example of an astablemultivibrator – are you able guess what astableme

-68-We’ve been constructing tones with audio oscillatorsfor so long that it might seem as if there’s no otherway to produce tones from electronic circ

-69-Do you know of someone who is a big mouth? (Or,have you ever been accused of being one?) Thisexperiment lets you and your friends see who’s gotthe

-154-Diodes: Are like one-way streets. They allow thecurrent to flow in only one direction. There are threeof these in your kit. Your kit contains one

-70-Think you have good night vision? This experiment isa game that lets you find out how well you can see inthe dark. In a completely dark room, it t

-71-What does “one-shot” mean to you?Turn the switch to A, and see what happens to LED1 when you press the key once at a time. Try holdingthe key down

-72-This is another type of one-shot circuit; in this projectyou hear the effects of the multivibrator. From theschematic you can see that this experi

-88-VIII. MEET THE OPERATIONAL AMPLIFIER-73-This is another circuit that uses both transistor andNAND type multivibrators. As you hear a soundthrough

-74-Carefully compare the schematic for this experimentwith the schematic for the last experiment. While theyare similar in many ways, but there’s a c

-75-Does anything look familiar about the schematic forthis project? This circuit uses an R-S flip-flop circuitmade from NAND gates, comparable to the

-76-Here’s a variant of the last project. This time we usean R-S flip-flop made with transistors and a NANDmultivibrator.You will hear a sound in the

-77-VII. OSCILLATOR APPLICATION CIRCUITS-84-Now you will let one oscillator control another tocreate an alarm. Here we have a multivibrator-typeoscill

-78-This experiment is an oscillator that is controlled inan abnormal way: with a pencil mark! You havecaught a glimpse in other oscillator projects

-79-Now you will build an oscillator using two transistorsconnected directly to each other. As you havewitnessed, there are many ways to make anoscill

-153--8-Antenna: This cylindrical component with a coil offine wire wrapped around it is a radio antenna. Ifyou’re wondering what the dark colored rod

-80- -81-This circuit is an oscillator with a slow frequency, andyou can see the LED lighting and turning off. The offtime is longer than the on time,

-81-This is the electronic bird circuit that you built forProject 6 (The Woodpecker), but now it has aphotoelectric control of the transistor base. Th

-82-The “R-C” in this experiment’s name representsresistance-capacitance. You have seen how varyingresistance and capacitance can affect the pulsingac

-83-Did you know that a transistor alters itscharacteristics according to the temperature? Thisexperiment will show you how temperature affectstransis

-84-Now you will let one oscillator control another tocreate an alarm. Here we have a multivibrator-typeoscillator controlling a pulse oscillator. The

-85-In this experiment you will make a push/pull, squarewave oscillator. This oscillator is known a push/pullbecause it uses two transistors that are

-86-You have seen how a capacitor’s charge/dischargecycle can be used to delay certain circuit operations.Now let’s slow the oscillator action in this

-87-This circuit has a multivibrator connected to a pulsetype oscillator. Rather than turning the oscillatorcompletely on and off, the multivibrator p

-88-VIII. MEET THE OPERATIONAL AMPLIFIER

For this section you will need some basicunderstanding about the operational amplifierintegrated circuit. First, we can use separate powersources or w

-152--9-Switch: You know what a switch is – you useswitches every day. When you slide (or flip) to theproper position, the circuit will be completed,

After you finish the wiring, set the switch to position B.LEDs 1 and 2 indicate the output voltage of theoperational amplifier IC. An LED lights if it

-91-In this experiment, you will make a microphoneamplifier, using the operational amplifier (op amp) asa non-inverting amplifier with two power sourc

-92-This is another two-power source microphoneamplifier, but this one is an inverting amplifier. Youwill use the earphone as a microphone again.Slide

-93-In Projects 72 and 73 (“Non-inverting Dual SupplyOp Amp,” and “Inverting Dual Supply Op Amp,”respectively), we used the operational amplifier with

-94-This is the last in the series of microphone amplifiers.Now you will use the operational amplifier as adifferential amplifier. It is a two-power s

-95-You know that an LED promptly lights when you turnit on. You can also light it up gradually. In this project,you’ll be able to observe the LEDs sl

-96-In this experiment, we will make a constant currentcircuit, using an operational amplifier and atransistor. This circuit maintains a constant curr

-97-Now you’re going to make a blinking LED circuitusing an operational amplifier. In this experiment, anLED continuously lights and turns off slowly.

-98-Begin by sliding the switch to position B and wiringthe circuit. This LED flasher uses two diodes. As youbuild this experiment, be sure to connect

-99-The LED circuits in experiments 78 and 79(“Operational Amplifier Blinking LED” and “LEDFlasher”) each use one LED, but the circuit in thisproject