My introduction to electronics and hardware builds came courtesy of these little red Science Fair kits Radio Shack made in the mid 70s.
I was about 12 and had zero experience soldering or building anything, but I was fascinated with these kits, that featured a bunch of discrete components that mounted on a decidedly not heat resistant plastic breadboard case.
I asked my dad for a soldering iron and he gave me this bad boy:
An industrial strength 250 watt gun, along with acid core solder meant for doing heavy duty electric wiring.
With zero skill and this monster, I wasted no time completely melting down several of these kits, much to my frustration.
It was only later in my teens that I discovered the 5w pencil iron and learned from a neighbor how to apply heat correctly, use flux and better solder, and finally could produce a solder joint without lots of collateral damage
In spite of this, I somehow mangled together a few of these kits and got them to work, even with a fair amount of melted plastic, and experienced the magic and fun of making stuff. Young old guy does stuff ig lol.
