EEVblog #737 - World's Biggest Collection Of Electronics Components

hi guys I'm out on a rural property here at Marotta in western Sydney and I scored something on eBay just here to pick it up and I thought that's pretty much all they had but I which is it's pretty good in its own right I was very impressed to get this but check out what else is in here Wow you will love this guy's up one here right you'll love this they're ripping it all apart but this was all owned by a guy named David sparks and that I tried to get or silicon chip magazines and things like that but there are the ei I didn't know they had EA archives anyway I tried to get a silicon chip one but look what I scored this is this is what I've got all these tins all of these tins full of everything and you're not going to believe what I've got them for 30 bucks for all these tins all labeled look collar clamps all sorts of screws support hinges all sorts of stuff and so yeah it's just like absolutely crazy what I got so this guy was absolutely meticulous in how he sorted stuff nuts and bolts types plain washers all sorts of and all sorts of screws so fantastic and everything in here is is going they haven't listed everything yet but what I really want to show you is in here this is got to be the ultimate electronics home workshop look at this look pots all these pots caps all sorted Wow how much time and effort went into this like there's all these are capacitors I haven't looked at all this yet all these capacitors all these are capacitors potentiometers sisters resistors resistors trimmers ah look at all this I mean this is just crazy like real old-school trimmers unbelievable what the hell was this guy into and there's more what do we got we got switches we got micro switches look at this crazy well we got tube sockets well got connectors battery connectors like just crazy Wow well how about some real old-school but all tons of switches look there's tube sockets connectors connectors so real old-school stuff obviously into vintage repair and things like that but then we've got headers and stuff like that absolutely incredible and then look are these all tubes and ah my lad Phillips all tubes look at this this is ridiculous and more connectors crazy have you ever seen a more sorted collection of this like this is like old school electronics store and this is in this guy's own home workshop Wow do this resistor networks crazy inductors inductors transformers more caps there's more capsule you can poke a stick at unbelievable so ceramic look at all our ceramic caps Wow I mean and they want to get rid of all this stuff - they have no idea what to do with it and I'm not surprised so they're happy to take offers on all this stuff so relays electromechanical or hundreds of different tour dozens at least dozens different types of realized crystals conductors crystal filters know that Wow oscillators delay lines display modules VFD display modules crystals and filters indicators and lamps resistor networks fuses and breakers Wow and that's just that wall there and it looks like we've got more tubes and stuff or your old school guys transistors bipolar there we go about TT series Wow separate into all the series to SC 18 hundreds of to SC 1900's where our two and three oh double fives this is the mother lode it really is I've never seen a collection like this it's just absolutely stunning absolutely stunning small signal MOSFETs like each individually bagged for this dual game n channel mosfet Wow got to be kidding me chips 7900 series CMOS micro memory control display controllers Reed amplifiers what 4000 series TVA or linear series look TDI audio amps bipolar logic all your seven for series stuff wow just like hey I'm stunned why I've never seen a collection like this this is in his home like you back at workshop like what was this guy into where he got all his parts from maybe he bought out an old electronics shopper used to have one yet his name was David sparks I lose a bell I'm not sure why but I Luna this is just ridiculous and they haven't listed this stuff yet they have not listed it so it's like like kind of like make an offer kind of thing it's just ah what do you do how much would you offer to something like this I got no idea what's in these like rotary wafers switches like where would you even store all this stuff it's just Wow has anyone ever seen a bigger or better collection than this or better sorted or in it guarantee you haven't this is insane Wow and oh there's more stuff hang on almost forgot about this well this this is his a teske room where he did stuff and apparently um ultraviolet lights apparently so yeah look it's kind of ultraviolet lights in here there we go there we go switch them order that's just it's you know let me see if I can get all this back on there we go we're we're back on but check it out all this old-school top our five six one Tektronix two five six four five four five guy was obviously collected something's gone horribly wrong on that 475 transistor curve tracer look at this a five seven six curve tracer they're pretty rare here in Australia there you don't get too many of those Wow PCM test set old school don't know what's in there hmm I haven't even heard of that company Wow so ten aaron b is 6:01 old school stuff Oh analog meter and yes so he's had a this is obviously where he did a fair bit of work and I think it's like going overseas or something I don't know they hired somebody um to sell all this stuff on eBay like one of these professional companies who who sell it so who sell gear Wow I don't even want to know its spine there well yes I do it's unbelievable anyway guys that is the mother lode that is the best workshop collection of electronic parts I have ever seen in my entire life please if anyone can beat it post photos or videos or whatever down below I don't think you can this is insane anyway I am very happy about the nuts and bolts thing I set up so I'll do some video when I have that back I'll set those up in the bankroll something like that but and check this out we found this in a box it looks like my first guess would be a Mercury rectifier um can anyone confirm look at that Wow England Gibbs and check these out looks like we have some older CRT tubes probably uh tech I'd say don't know that is early late no idea what that's wrong that's from summer we're gonna gear but yeah whole bunch of scope chips and all these valves in here these are all all original my lord Phillips okay milliwatts and there were all the ones in the colored ones they're all original and all the ones in the whites they're all refurbished like you know a generic brand ones or something like that so and apparently he's got all of these parts all of them in a spreadsheet a huge master spreadsheet knows exactly you can see they're numbered knows exactly what's where and yeah it's just have you ever seen anything better organizing this unbelievable where the guy got all this gear from I have no idea I like this and I'm a wire cable markers us leaving heat sinks heat sinks look at that man he's just like salvaged he must have got these salvaged out of gear he must have ferrets input I have transformers rotary way four switches aa massive inductors that he's I I thought like he must have like bought out a shop or something like that or had a shop to get all these parts and individually bagged like each one is individually handwritten and bad with all the st. they must have all been done it like they couldn't have been done years apart because all the labels and everything else there are they're all totally consistent totally consistent and like every one of them is like chock-a-block with parts and stuff it's just ah it's mental absolutely Bentall the really amazing thing about all these parts they are all secondhand they've all been actually those that's ones might have been somewhat new but they've all been D sold it in fact that was the only one I found new these are all D soldered parts all of them everything in here has been just D soldered like seven four double O's look look there we go if you know everything has been D soldered and that's the absolutely amazing thing about all this they're all I mean he's got some sort of packets of new stuff and he's labeled on some of them if they're new but otherwise they're yeah all just sandwich parts unbelievable must have spent his entire life just desoldering parts absolutely ridiculous and check it out look just like packets of diodes just desalted diodes unbelievable and look just it all individually wrapped and individually bagged and labeled everything folded it's just absolutely crazy Wow and it's all through-hole I haven't found any surface mount parts here yet at all it's just all old-school and there's all magazines books server racks all that sort of thing but ah I'll just leave you with that shot look at that catch you next time and check it out i managed to transport them all back to the bunker in i think one piece maybe the odd team has fallen down at the back there but and just a quick follow-up to that video sorry about the video quality I think I'd have had my camera set to the wrong setting I wasn't expecting to go out there and shoot any footage so I just got what I got and I actually ran out of memory card there so yeah sorry about that but anyway I hope you got a good idea of what that collection was like it was insane the first time I saw it wow this is like the Holy Grail you know it was like walking into a mouse or a digi-key warehouse was absolutely incredible but the more I looked at it and the more I thought about it looked off camera looked through some stuff it was all oh it was all through-hole stuff there was I couldn't find any surface mount stuff at all I didn't search every drop it looks like it was all pretty much I hate to use the word obsolete because pretty much all through-hole parts and most amazing of all it was or the vast majority of it was like d soldered salvaged parts I this David sparks guy my hat off to him absolutely he must have sat there thousands and thousands of hours of desoldering parts and and individually bagged in each one if it wasn't enough that they were all you know use those um takeaway containers to store each one inside each one of those almost without exception they were all the parts were individually bagged as well in little tiny Ziploc bags and all itemized with their value and part number and everything else I mean there were I don't know you know a thousand plus takeaway storage containers and then each one of those had you know couldn't have up to a dozen bags in them all individually categorized Wow and it's just a shame that it wasn't all sort of new parts it was new parts would be worth an absolute fortune if and had all you know modern SMD stuff and things like that but that's obviously what this sad guy was into he was into you know a vintage stuff and salvaging parts and anyway I was absolutely blown away by that I have never seen or heard of a better personal collection than that maybe there might be ones bigger but I doubt there's any one that is more personal perfectly organized and categorized than that it was just stunning anyway I did get some photos of almost all of the drawers and things like that so if you're curious to see exactly what was on the labels hopefully I haven't reviewed them I think I got them all in focus and opposed to the video anyway they'll be linked in down below on eevblog dot-com so check them out but there you go if you know of a bigger or better personal lab component collection than that one leave it in the comments I think people will be struggling too I'm going to claim that is one of the world's biggest and most impressive collections at least of salvaged components Wow catch you next time you you

Channel: EEVblog

Views: 305,493

Rating: 4.9206457 out of 5

Keywords: ebay, auction, score, used, collection, worlds biggest, electronic, components, digikey, mouser, element 14, sorting, labels, through-hole

Id: x8nbHYOc8ns

Length: 17min 9sec (1029 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 25 2015

Reddit Comments

[u/EkriirkE]

Lots o' parts? Neat. Mostly recovered by desoldering? Whoa.

^Whoa.

[u/Martel_the_Hammer]

Dave is my spirit animal.

[u/[deleted]]

Is "moving overseas" an Australian euphemism for "died"? I guess Dave didn't want to dwell on the fact it was apparently an estate sale. No one who invested what must have been a tenth of their life in desoldering would leave that to be auctioned off by non-electronics people.

[u/Zuph]

A meticulously organized, vast collection of parts, but all of them are through-hole, and all are recovered by desoldering? Clearly this is hell.

[u/kaihatsusha]

I'm not sure the point of the UV lighting in the test room? Focused UV could be used to erase old EEPROMs and such, but I doubt you'd wire a whole room for that. It's pretty destructive. Maybe it was his way of maintaining a farmer's tan while during a decidedly indoor lifestyle?

[u/Dominic11112]

"All toobs!"

[u/jrmxrf]

And all this sold for $405 on ebay!

wha...

[u/Jasper1984]

Wonder what he made, or maybe he sold/gave parts to people needing particular ones? Or maybe he was just a bit crazy? Or maybe desoldering and organization was his way of meditating^* .. lol. Thought his name had special meaning or something.

[u/squaretire]

Kansas preemptively wrote a song about this guy, way back in 1977.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIHXhFJ4FoM#t=71s