I got a toy when I was young, probably around the early 90s late 80s.

It was a learning system on how to build electronics.

It was a panel with a picture of a robot, and metal prongs you could connect by little wires they had in the toy.

It came with a book that showed you how to build alarm system, motion detectors, and such, all by connecting the wires, but it also gave you a blueprints of how the circuit worked.


I wish I have one now that I was older.

Anyone know what I'm talking about?

not really...probably one of the Salter 101 electronics kits or something...
look in the scientific/educational toys section of a good catalogue....I think they still sell them...but perhaps nowadays they will have a small breadboard rather than a sheet of plastic with springs on em...

If I remember correctly they had little coiled springs that you bent back to connect all your components together...some of the better kits even had an opamp as opposed to just a transistor or two !!

ya, now i remember they were springs.

Uh, any catalogues to suggest? Or website?

They're collectibles now

I remember really, really wanting one of these back in the day [shamelessly ripped from an ebay ad].

I guess they still exist though:
http://www.musicfromouterspace.com/a...atyouneed.html

More practically, a standard white nylon breadboard, some solid hookup wire and a couple mail-order catalogs from your local electronics distributor would probably serve you better (unless you're purposely going for the nostalgia angle).

try this..

http://www.intellitoys.co.uk/acatalo...ronics_34.html

look at the University of Cambridge kit...

gawd...I want one now

It won't matter if your 9 or 90, the principles it teaches you and the knoweledge imparted remain good. Ok, so you might feel a little silly at 45 going into a shop to buy it for yourself...so you actually go and buy it for your Nephew, or Grandson, and play alongside the kids...
Once they figure it all out (about 20 mins), they can teach you

Actually, there's no shame in buying one for yourself, these kits are extremely educational, and in my opinion every engineer should have one to refer to when their memory fails them...(no pun intended )

Time to take that Grandson of yours shopping then Nigel

good on you...get me one when yer in

lego technic? try mindstorms. I "bought" my kids a set. heh heh. lots of fun but the micro in version 1 was utterly pathetic. still, my kids did get a sense of programming.

I got one of those radioshack spring things when I was like 10-12 and thought it was pretty pathetic. I don't think this one even had transistors in it. But then I was checking out books on integrated circuit design at that point. I did get a radioshack shortwave radio kit. it worked suprisingly well for a 3 transistor design. I used to piss off my dad by tuning radio moscow (he was an officer in the USAF).