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It’s been a big year here at the Maker Shed. This has been our best year on record and we’ve shipped thousands of orders to makers all over the world! Ever wonder what our top products are? Below are the Top 10 items shipped from the Maker Shed in 2011.

#10

Make: Electronics Components Pack 2 – The second component pack from the wildly popular Make: Electronics series has all the parts you need to complete chapters 3 & 4 in Make Electronics.

#9

Make: Electronics – This wonderfully written book by author Charles Platt takes the mystery out of electronics and teaches you in a fun, experimental way. It’s the perfect way to get started in electronics, even if you have no idea what a resistor is!

#8

Minty Boost USB Charger Kit – This handy charger gives your power hungry gadgets a much needed boost. It’s simple, small, incredibly useful, and it fits into a mint tin!

#7

Make: Electronics Components Pack 1 – The first component pack in the Make: Electronics series. It includes everything you need to complete the experiments from chapters 1 & 2 of Make: Electronics. We’ve spend countless hours sourcing these components so you don’t have to!

#6

Learn to Solder Skill Badge Kit – Thousands of people learn to solder at Maker Faires all over the country using this kit. It’s simple, fun, and teaches you the basics of soldering. Plus, it’s flashy and you get to tell everyone who sees it that you made it yourself!

#5

Mintronics Survival Pack – This handy components collection is perfect for prototyping on the go or for a quick electronics fix. It contains over 60 components all packaged in a mint tin, ready to help out at a moment’s notice.

#4

MakerShield Kit – Our #1 top selling Arduino Shield, this is what we consider to be the best prototyping shield available for both the Arduino and Netduino. It’s selectable for 5 or 3.3 volts, has 2 LEDs, a potentiometer, a user definable button, a reset button, ICSP headers, and plenty of prototyping space so you can solder your own circuits or use a mini-breadboard (sold separately.)

#3

Deluxe Breadboard Jumper Wires – Whether you use them with breadboards or plug them directly into your microcontroller, you can never have too many jumper wires! These wires are extra flexible and have smooth, round ends so they slide perfectly into breadboards or headers.

#2

Getting Started with Arduino V3.0 – The name says it all. This kit contains everything you need to learn the basics of Arduino. It contains everything you need to follow along with the examples in Massimo Banzi’s Getting Started with Arduino, 2nd Edition book (not included.) It’s the perfect way to get started with Arduino!

#1

Arduino Uno – No surprise here! The Arduino is the absolute Maker Shed best seller. This little microcontroller has taken the world by storm for good reason; it’s easy to use, has an incredible community, and can be used for everything from blinking LEDs to controlling fuel injection systems. It’s like the Little Engine that Could… if the Little Engine were a microcontroller.

Dino Segovis has posted his plans for making an Arduino-based New Year Mini Ball Drop LED Timer. You activate it with one minute left in the year and five LEDs inside ping pong balls simulate the dropping ball. At the stroke of midnight, a 2012 sign lights up as the trusty tone library plays Auld Lang Syne. So if you want to recreate the Times Square ball drop this New Year’s Eve without standing in the freezing cold among throngs of inebriated revelers, check out Dino’s latest creation!

Jason Gessner’s wife is an avid runner and they’ve often joked that she puts in more miles than he does in his car. This inspired Jason to create an odometer to track the miles his wife logs during training and races. Jason used a numerical readout he found at a surplus store and hooked it up to a Motor Shield. A computer with Ruby checks the DailyMile API every minute for new entries and sends a signal to the Arduino over serial to increment the counter with a satisfying click for each mile his wife has logged. This is only his first prototype of the project; Jason plans on making a nice enclosure for it and is considering making the odometer wireless. As a runner myself, I love this idea and would love to work on my own version. Luckily for me, Jason has posted his code here. Nice work, Jason!