[lovelearning]

I'm a programmer who'd never tried electronics till an year ago but have now managed to build a few things - that even involve homemade PCBs and SMD soldering.

1) I started by buying an arduino, a starter kit and some simple sensors and actuators - ultrasonic, gyro, servos, motor driver - on ebay.

2) read Pratt's "Make Electronics" and Wiley's "Electronics for Dummies"

3) started making. Understood theoretical concepts by doing.

4) I regularly watch DIY youtube channels and follow RSS feeds of sites like Instructables and Hackaday.io

5) I'm not yet capable of building a UAV, but I've already built a couple of robots.

It's not really tough, and it's a fantastic side hobby. It's also turned me into a more careful software programmer, constantly double and triple checking everything, because electronic circuits are not as forgiving of mistakes as software.

So I'd say get started right away. It's gonna be fun!

[Raphmedia]

I didn't see your reply until today.

Thanks! I'll take a look at those books.

Any good links you could throw my way while we are at it?

[lovelearning]

For purchasing, just search "arduino starter kits" in ebay, adafruit or sparkfun.

For learning, check out :

[1] https://learn.adafruit.com/category/learn-arduino

[2] https://learn.sparkfun.com/start_a_project

[aliakhtar]

Can you share which components you bought to start with, i.e which starter kit, which sensors / motors, etc? Thanks!

[lovelearning]

There's no dearth of starter kits. Just search for arduino starter kit on Ebay or Sparkfun. They come with an assortment of components like resistors, capacitors, diodes, transistors, 9V battery connector and a few sensors.

Additionally, I bought a couple of the widely available HC-SR04 ultrasonic sensors, a couple of turnigy small servos, an L293 motor driver, couple of L-shaped BO DC motors, and robot chassis. Just search for those terms on ebay.

[1]: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9065