If your New Year’s resolution for 2015 is to be more hands-on with technology, I’d recommend the “Color Visualizer” kit by Quin Etnyre (Qtechknow) and Makershed as a great place to start. It’s fun to play with and an amazingly simple kit to assemble, consisting of 11 parts.
This great beginner/learn-to-solder kit has quick payoffs. Everything except the batteries came in the bag. I found it very easy to figure out where all the parts went. I’ve included instructions as part of my kit review to help you get going.
Here is an image of the parts that came in the bag:
Here is an image of the completed kit:
Here is a video of a demonstration of the kit:
Click here for a 5-minute time lapse that includes build instructions.
The kit works like this: a battery powers the kit. The power goes three ways - to the different colors in the LED - but is stopped by the potentiometers. As the “pots” are turned, they release more and more power to the LED, making it brighter and brighter with that color. Different colors combined make other colors, similar to combining primary-color paints.
I had a quick and easy time assembling the kit, and I love playing with it. Overall, I give it a 5 out of 5 Very Happy Robots.
