How To Get FREE Electronic parts !

[Ocalon]

The cost of buying electronic parts for our projects from Radio Shack or anywhere else are quite expensive now days. And most of us have a limited budget in buying stuff.

But, if you know the secrets of how to get electronic parts for free, you could be saving your self hundreds of bucks! Here's how:

1. You probably have never noticed this, but most manufactures and suppliers will give away free samples of their high quality electronic parts.

However, control your self! Don't ask for hundreds of components! No company will give you that much, just ask for a few.

Here is a list of some companies and manufactures that will give you some of their free samples:

• Fairchild Semiconductor
  Texas Instruments
  STMicroelectronics
  MARL
  WIMA

2. Talk to the people you know well, like your family and friends if they have any electronic device they are going to throw out, they may be glad to give it to you.

I successfully got a portable TV, an answering machine, scanner, printer, you name it by simply asking around!

3. You can find pretty good stuff from the computer repair stores...

If you ask the manager nicely for blown electronic equipment like PSU's DVD/CD burners, they will usually give it to you.

If you do get a DVD/CD burner, you are very lucky...
Because inside a DVD/CD burner, it has a laser diode that cost several hundred bucks! With that laser, you can make a cool burning laser flashlight.

I hope this helps you with some of your projects!

If you have any questions, or need help, found an error, or anything, make a comment!

[cakeeater]

Those are a some great ways of getting electronics! But your options dont stop there!

For those of you that are intersted in a more exciting and much more sneaky way of getting electronic parts try a dumpster! I suggest an old pawn shop. They have many different electronics such as printers, monitors, tvs, amps and just whatever you can think of if you go dig deep enough you can find what you need

Another place to get parts would be a thrift store. I know this is not free but its pretty close. There are plenty of old electronics you might not find in other places. On Mondays value village has certain color tags for a dollar! Thats pretty much a steal

hope this helped out some!

[Doc Oc]

Try avoid skips or dumpsters that are filled with rotten foods or other disgusting stuff, because it smells bad and you may end up having some health problems...

Try grab some stuff that you can sell on ebay, car boot (trunk) sales, garage sales.... You can make a good chunk of change doing that.

I've sold literally thousands of dollars worth of this stuff. Some items I give away to the truly needy. Other items find their way into my home and workshop where they are put to good use.

!!!!*** One word of caution, "Be polite". There are others who dumpster dive, and I've run across a few who are quite territorial. Use your people skills, and be willling to share!

[seditte09]

Something Ive been wondering for quite a while... How did all of you guys get here? Some of you Ive known during the old NF days, say about the first 40 members or so, but what about all the other people? Which link/friend/site or whatever got you here?