Announcing new website for In The Lab With Jay Jay

Good news everyone!

The In The Lab With Jay Jay website has been freeloading off jj5.net for a while now, over here: https://www.inthelabwithjayjay.com/in-the-lab/

But I am pleased to announce that it has now been moved into its new and permanent home, over here: InTheLabWithJayJay.com

There is also a short-link domain which will redirect you to the new site which I put into production to keep the links on my business cards short: jjlab.net

Speaking of business cards I had some made to take with me to ElectroneX on Wednesday:

John's new business card for In The Lab With Jay Jay

I’m planning to show up in costume and hand out business cards, because I am a *genuine* nerd.

As part of the migration to the new domain I improved the content of the site a bit. There is now an about page with contact info and such and also a support the show page with some ideas about how people can support the show!

Channel News #3: Announcing Mini Projects | Learning Electronics In The Lab With Jay Jay

This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

You can support this channel on Patreon: patreon.com/JohnElliotV

Silly Job Title: Amp Alchemist

In this video I announce the new Mini Projects. These are a new feature of Silicon Chip magazine sponsored by Jaycar. Each month two or three Mini Projects get published in Silicon Chip, and we will be building those projects together on the channel each month!

If you’re interested in Silicon Chip magazine (it’s really good!) then I would certainly encourage you to subscribe.

In this video I misspoke and said this was the “May 2004” issue of the magazine, but of course it is the “May 2024” issue of the magazine! Unfortunately I missed that errata during editing and didn’t include a title clip correction.

I don’t understand what happened that caused that video corruption we saw earlier in the video. I suspect the workstation I was using to record the video had some other processing task which interfered with its recording speed or something? Hopefully this is not an ongoing problem. It’s not a problem I have seen before.

Update: ElectroneX has now been and gone and my write up about the day is over here: My day at ElectroneX with my friend. I got my photo with Dave Jones!

Thanks very much for watching! And please remember to hit like and subscribe!


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Visitor Alarm | Project 9/20 | Maxitronix 20in1 | Learning Electronics In The Lab With Jay Jay

This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

You can support this channel on Patreon: patreon.com/JohnElliotV

In this video I do the ninth Maxitronix 20in1 Electronic Project Lab project: Visitor Alarm.



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Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Yum Cha 16MP USB CameraThis is an image of the product.

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Electronics Project #6: Piezoelectric Buzzer Volume Control | In The Lab With Jay Jay

This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

You can support this channel on Patreon: patreon.com/JohnElliotV

Silly Job Title: Amp Alchemist

In this video I put a 2k potentiometer in series with a piezoelectric buzzer to act as a volume control.

The project I mention in the beginning of this video is the Educational 555 Board from PCBWay which we will build and test soon.

The video I make the hook clip test probes in is this one: Electronics Project: Hook Clip Test Probes to DuPont Jumpers | In The Lab With Jay Jay.

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Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Yum Cha Long Handle Wire BrushThis is an image of the product.notes

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Interlude #5: Learning LTspice Part 2 | Learning Electronics In The Lab With Jay Jay

This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

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Part 1 of this two part series is here.

In this video I continue to make my first LTspice circuit simulation. I am running this software under Wine on KDE Plasma running on Debian 12 bookworm.

I got some help with this simulation over on the EEVblog forum: Help with modeling multivibrators in LTspice.

There are some important errata concerning the above over on the EEVblog:

Thanks very much for watching! And please remember to hit like and subscribe!


Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Maxitronix 30 In 1 (30in1) Electronics Project Lab KitThis is an image of the product.notes

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Interlude #4: Learning LTspice Part 1 | Learning Electronics In The Lab With Jay Jay

This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

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Part 2 of this two part series is here.

In this video I begin to use LTspice for the first time. I am running this software under Wine on KDE Plasma running on Debian 12 bookworm.

This is part one of two. In the second part I will show you the answers I got from my question over on the EEVblog forum.

My first LTspice circuit is the following circuit from project 9 from the Maxitronix Sensor Robot 20, which I have code named the 20in1.

The wires, power supply, resistors, capacitors, and transistors were easy to model, but the piezo buzzer and the CdS cell were both tricky.

In the end I found the Misc/xtal.asy component to use for the piezo buzzer. I got the various parameters for it from this datasheet (I just picked that component at random, I’m not sure what actual piezo buzzer is used in the Maxitronix kit).

The answer to my question on the EEVblog included hints about how to model the CdS cell.

Armed with my new knowledge I am now prepared to make part two of this interlude, so please stand by for that.

Thanks very much for watching! And please remember to hit like and subscribe!


Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Yum Cha 29 In 1 Mini Precision Screwdriver SetThis is an image of the product.notes

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New Book Teardown #4: Beginner’s Guide to Reading Schematics 4th Edition (2018) | In The Lab

This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

You can support this channel on Patreon: patreon.com/JohnElliotV

Silly Job Title: Electron Enchanter

This video is part of the New Book Teardown feature of my video blog.

In this video I take a look at Beginner’s Guide to Reading Schematics, Fourth Edition by Stan Gibilisco published in 2018. The book has 209 pages.

Some things which came up during the video:

From the Wikipedia article on Bifilar coil: A bifilar coil is an electromagnetic coil that contains two closely spaced, parallel windings. In electrical engineering, the word bifilar describes wire which is made of two filaments or strands. It is commonly used to denote special types of winding wire for transformers. Wire can be purchased in bifilar form, usually as different colored enameled wire bonded together. For three strands, the term trifilar coil is used.

From the Wikipedia article on Power dividers and directional couplers: Power dividers (also power splitters and, when used in reverse, power combiners) and directional couplers are passive devices used mostly in the field of radio technology. They couple a defined amount of the electromagnetic power in a transmission line to a port enabling the signal to be used in another circuit. An essential feature of directional couplers is that they only couple power flowing in one direction. Power entering the output port is coupled to the isolated port but not to the coupled port. A directional coupler designed to split power equally between two ports is called a hybrid coupler.

From the Wikipedia article on Waveguide: A waveguide is a structure that guides waves by restricting the transmission of energy to one direction. Common types of waveguides include acoustic waveguides which direct sound, optical waveguides which direct light, and radio-frequency waveguides which direct electromagnetic waves other than light like radio waves.

The list of parts suppliers from the back of the book (some have closed down):

The books from the suggested additional reading:

The author’s website is here: https://www.sciencewriter.net/

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Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Yum Cha Telescopic Magnetic Pickup With LightThis is an image of the product.

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Old Book Teardown #7: Engineering Electronics with Industrial Applications and Control (1957)

This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

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Silly Job Title: Electron Enchanter

This video is part of the Old Book Teardown feature of my video blog.

In this video I tear down Engineering Electronics with Industrial Applications and Control by John D. Ryder. This book was published in the USA in 1957. The book comprises 666 pages and is chock full of schematics with old vacuum tubes and photos from old Cathode Ray Oscilloscopes (CROs).

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Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Yum Cha Orange Telescopic Magnetic Pickup ToolThis is an image of the product.

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Electronics Project #5: Hook Clip Test Probes to DuPont Jumpers | In The Lab With Jay Jay

This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

You can support this channel on Patreon: patreon.com/JohnElliotV

Silly Job Title: Electron Enchanter

In this video we make a set of cables with hook clips on one end and DuPont jumpers on the other end.

Thanks very much for watching! And please remember to hit like and subscribe!


Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

ANENG AN-999S Bench MultimeterThis is an image of the product.notes

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