The various prototyping shields available for Arduino are a great, sturdy way to add a breadboard. The Boarduino is another nice way to securely attach an Arduino-like device to a breadboard. But if you already have an Arduino and a solderless breadboard, you can attach the two together with an amazing bit of open source technology called a rubber band.
It’s pretty friggen great.
You can get these small solderless breadboards from either Adafruit.com or All Electronics. They’re about $5.
Run a few power and ground lines and you have a nice little prototyping infrastructure.
And then you can start doing some real circuits.
I can’t take credit for this innovation. As I was poking through the class notes for the Berkeley Tangible User Interfaces class, I noticed they use this method.
I knew I should have patented this! I actually had items in my cart from your previous prototyping board design and then I was like….why am I paying for something I can do myself for free?
…and I thought I was being a low-tech cheapskate using sticky-back Velcro.
Why didn’t I think of that?!?!?
Hey Tod, quick question, what do you use to make your awesome diagrams, like this one from the boarduino+nunchuck post:
http://todbot.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/boarduino-nunchuck-servo-450.png
Hi Chutzpah, I use Omnigraffle.
nice trick there!
(Omnigraffe: wow, nice program, one more reason to get a mac… wish they made nice looking software like this for windows…)
Wow! I’ve had my Arduino rubber-banded onto my bread board since I got it several months ago. I was jealous of all the mini-breadboard shield owners.
Thank you for validating me!
Great PDF Arduino Notebook BTW!
Hm, open source _rubber band_, eh? Care to share a source and price tag for these critters? SCNR.
[...] Half-sized Breadboard – 400 connection points, plenty of room for beginner projects, with 2 power rails on the side. Can be rubber-banded to an Arduino to make a 1-penny devboard [...]
Instead of rubber bands, I use some cut and bent paper clips that go through the bolt holes on the PCB and into the holes of my breadboard (I have a large board approx. 2.5x the size of the Arduino Duemilanove), so my Ard. is securely mounted and I have loads of prototyping room.
http://www.instructables.com/member/zoltzerino/ – Check out my Arduino traffic lights! :-D
Those bent paperclips are a great idea!