Reviews, Health, and Other Stuff: Soldering Project

Welcome

Welcome to my ever-evolving blog. It started out as a blog on Beachbody workouts and products, mainly when I was a Beachbody coach. I no longer coach, not because I don't believe in Beachbody's programs (I subscribe to Beachbody on Demand and use their workouts every day), I am just not a salesperson and hated that aspect of it. I am more than willing to answer questions about my experiences with their products and the various workouts, and I feel freer to do so without the appearance of giving a biased review of something.

I have also started adding reviews for various things I have purchased like movies, books, CDs, and other products. This was brought about by a fight with Amazon in which all of my reviews were removed over a completely bullshit allegation that I posted a review that violated their terms of service. After going back and forth with the morons in the community-reviews department (even after they admitted that my posts did not violate their guidelines) they restored my account (which took them six months to do), but I have been posting my reviews on my blog to have them preserved in case something like that happens again. And here, I will post uncensored reviews so I will swear from time to time and post reviews that may be longer than Amazon's character limit. Everything I post here on any topic or product is my personal opinion, and I take no compensation for any product reviews I post. I am a member of Amazon's vine program and because I get those products for free, I keep those reviews on Amazon only, but everything I have purchased with my own money, whether from Amazon or some other store/website/outlet, I will post here.

I also plan to do some longer blog posts on various topics, such as how to learn physics, how to get through calculus, and longer reviews of workout programs as I do them. Basically, whatever strikes me as interesting at the time. As you can see if you navigate around the blog, I had many years in between postings. During that time I was going back to school to get an engineering degree, and learning material that I avoided my first time through college was a different experience and one that gave me a lot of insight into how to do well in those classes, which I will try to impart here for those who are looking to get a science or engineering degree.

Monday, August 21, 2023

Product Review: Helping Hands Soldering Station

This is a good inexpensive soldering station and is definitely worth the price. The soldering iron is fine but would have been better with an assortment of tips and being able to adjust the temp. The helping hand station is very helpful to identify resistor values by bands or read the value of capacitors if you do not have great eyesight. It is also very useful if you ever have to solder wires together.

Sunday, September 4, 2022

Product Review: Velleman Sa Electronic Decision Maker Kit

During my introduction to electrical engineering class, we had to do a couple of small soldering projects. This is a small kit that requires a push-button, some capacitors, resistors, etc to be mounted/soldered to a very small circuit board. The instructions are okay, but not the most well-written instructions. But, they are not impossible to figure out. Basically, you push the button, and either a green LED (representing "yes") or a red LED (representing "no") will light up, randomly. The board is so small that it can be difficult to work with to get the components mounted, and you will need to be careful to keep your fingers out of the way when you are soldering. It is a fun project that can be put together fairly quickly.