I recently got this mil-spec ceramic hybrid alphanumeric LED display module. Hopefully I'll be able to figure out how to interface with it in a reasonable amount of time. It likely will require some sort of serial interface though so hopes aren't high. Neat thing to look at though.

I made a breakout board for a realtime clock IC featuring an embedded TCXO. The IC is temporarily held in place with pogo pins for alignment, and a piece of acrylic is used to help press the IC onto the pads of the board. This allows me to program the IC for use in another PCB project.

One way of dealing with the alignment issue of soldering headers - if you have control over the PCB design - is to make the holes offset from one another such that the pins of the header will be snug against their respective through hole pads.

My lab room is usually dusty so I got a dental dust box and reversed the fans (for positive pressure) to create a pseudo "clean room" box for certain electronics assembly/testing procedures which require a more dust free environment.

I got my hands on one of those solderless mid-board launch 30 degree RF connectors. This is for future use in messing around with designing a PCB using distributed elements without having to solder connectors for testing. The initial "best guess" mounting footprint shows good return loss.

40 GHz Resistive RF power divider with wire bond pads adjacent to an upside-down 0402 silicon capacitor. Ruler is in millimeters.

I built a Mod-10 Counter using JK flip flops made up of NAND gates. Each acrylic encased PCB is a single flip flop. LED indicates status - green for 1 and red for 0. LSB is on the right most side.