Online · electronics · apprenticeship · since 2015

Build real hardware.
Learn real things.

AI can explain a circuit. It can’t tell you why yours isn’t working. This is a hands-on apprenticeship for people who want to design, build, and debug their own boards — and actually understand what’s happening under the mask.

Design
Assemble
Test
Troubleshoot
Revise

Find your bench.

Three ways in
FIRMWARE → HW

Software engineers moving to hardware

You write firmware all day, but when the board doesn’t work you’re stuck. A structured path from schematic to fab, with someone who’s done it thousands of times showing you what to check and why.

→ Start with the courses
BLIND SPOTS

Working engineers filling in gaps

You ship boards, but there are corners you’ve always worked around — signal integrity, power, systematic debug. Stop guessing, start reasoning about the parts you’ve been avoiding.

→ Browse the library
PORTFOLIO

Career changers & self-taught builders

You’ve watched the videos. You’ve read the tutorials. But you don’t have a portfolio of boards you designed, built, and debugged yourself. That’s what this program produces.

→ See how it works
The loop

Design. Assemble. Test. Troubleshoot. Revise.

It isn’t linear. It’s a loop — and the back half (test, troubleshoot, revise) is what turns a tutorial-follower into an engineer.

01DESIGN
Design
fig. i

Skills & mental models

Why this trace, not where the button is. Visualization, constraints, and an internal map of how the electrons move.

02ASSEMBLE
Assemble
fig. ii

Reality at the bench

Simulations don’t burn your fingers. Component selection, soldering, part programming, and the physical gotchas.

03TEST
Test
fig. iii

Verify what you built

Power up, probe nodes, capture waveforms — confirm the design behaves the way the schematic said it would, before you trust it in a system.

04TROUBLESHOOT
Troubleshoot
fig. iv

The critical skill

When the smoke clears and the LED is dark, what do you do? A rigorous process of measurement and deduction beats guessing every time.

05REVISE
Revise
fig. v

Close the loop

What you learned at the bench feeds the next rev. Better symbols, tighter footprints, smarter routing — every cycle makes the next board faster to debug.

Fifth edition
Practical
Electronics
for Inventors
SCHERZ · GAMMELL
The book

The book we wish we’d had when we started.

1000+ pages bridging heavy theoretical textbooks and shaky hobbyist tutorials. Best-selling electronics textbook for a reason. A new edition — revised and authored by Chris — is due out late 2027.

1000+
pages
18
chapters
5th
edition · 2027
01Theory
02Basic electronic circuit components
03Semiconductors
04Optoelectronics
05Integrated circuits
06Digital electronics
07…and eleven more
08Appendices & errata
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Tier 01
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  • Free intro lessons
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Tier 02
Book study group
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  • Weekly book-club threads
  • Chapter walkthroughs
  • Errata & solutions
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Tier 04
Master
$279/mo
  • Everything in Apprentice
  • Two live sessions/mo with Chris
  • Mentorship on your projects
  • Priority design review
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