Point-to-point construction
The ends of lengths of wire or wire-ended components such as capacitors and resistors were pushed through the terminals, and usually looped and twisted.Point-to-point and terminal strip construction continued to be used for some vacuum tube equipment even after the introduction of printed circuit boards.Some audiophile equipment, such as amplifiers, continues to be point-to-point wired using terminal pins,[1] often in very small quantities.In this application modern point-to-point wiring is often used as a marketing design feature rather than a result of the economics of very-small-scale production.Sometimes true point-to-point wiring—without terminal strips—with very short connections, is still used at very high radio frequencies (in the gigahertz range) to minimise stray capacitance and inductance; the capacitance between a circuit-board trace and some other conductor, and the inductance of a short track, become significant or dominant at high frequencies.An example of this design is illustrated in an application note describing an avalanche transistor-based generator of pulses with risetime of a fraction of a nanosecond; the (few) critical components are connected directly to each other and to the output connector with the shortest possible leads.Electric guitar amplifier manufacturer Marshall have reissued some of their older models, using this type of construction as a design feature, although their standard products have long used PCBs.A type of breadboard specifically for prototyping has this layout, but with strips of metal spring contacts beneath a grid of holes into which components are pushed to make electrical connections like any removable connector.Information on high-frequency breadboarding and illustrations of dead bug with ground plane construction are in a Linear Technologies application note.
electronicscircuitsprinted circuit boardsthermionic valvessemiconductor circuitspower electronicselectronic componentsresistorscapacitorswire nutscorrodedmarine radiosMarconibus-bar circuitssolderingsolderwire wrapoperating proceduresturret boardsinsulatingbakelitechassissheet metalterminalrivetednailedscrewedTransformerstube socketsphotographsvacuum tubeZenithaudiophilemarketingradio frequenciesgigahertzstray capacitanceinductanceavalanche transistorTektronixoscilloscopesenclosureguitar amplifierMarshallBreadboardconnectorpower supplystripboardsStripboarddrill bitwiring penBEAM roboticsLinear Technologysurface-mount