Arduino Shields

Maker, DIY Arduino
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Let’s talk about shields and more specifically shields developed around the Arduino Uno platform.

ArduinoUno
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First a little info about what an Arduino uno is: the Arduino Uno is a development board used by students, hobbyists and professionals to help bring coding to life. The Uno has rows of female receptacles to allow you to plug in wires as a temporary solution to hook up various components (such as LEDs, motors, sensors, buttons, etc etc).
MFG_A000065 MFG_714_sml 1141 MFG_DEV-13956

A shield is a circuit board that fits on top of the Arduino platform. Shields can have a specific purpose such as connectivity, driving motors, or a touchscreen; or they can be used to help ‘clean up’ projects and eliminate the need for a separate breadboard. This helps you make use of the various inputs / outputs (I/Os) with this development board, and allows for essentially plug and play capability without having to deal with a ton of loose wires and a breadboard.

So let’s highlight some of the really cool shields that we have:

See more Arduino shields on the DigiKey site Here.

Shield Accessories:
Some shields - but not all of them - will come with regular male pin headers to allow you to plug into the Arduino. I recommend picking up a set of Stacking connectors (such as 1568-1413-ND or 1528-1074-ND)

stacking
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Q: Do I have to use an Arduino Shield with an Arduino?
A: No! Arduino shields are widely used in the industry and have become a standard form factor. Take for example the microcontroller dev board STMicro Nucleo (497-14361-ND) which features the same set of rows used on the Uno.

More Info:
To read about Arduino shields on the Arduino Playground, Click Here

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Thanks @Linzee_1029 for this informative article. I have only just started my Arduino journey and have chosen the Arduino ATMega2560. I am wondering if you wrote a similar article updated for the 2560?

Of particular interest would be 2560 equivalent shields for the following ones you listed previously:

  • 1597-1146-ND – Relay shield - useful for home automation
  • 1597-1329-ND - Another screw shield, the neat thing about this the board is reduced to just the terminal blocks.
  • 1528-1207-ND – Proto shield
  • 1568-1522-ND - Weather Shield - Make your own Arduino Weather Station.
  • 1528-1047-ND - Wingshield - Add terminal block connections to your project.
  • 1528-1044-ND - Add SD Card / Data Logging capability

Also, When I was poking around for Stacking header pins I did not find a kit that would work for the 2650 including all the digital pins at the base of the board. Any ideas?

I also think an article on comapring the different types of shield proto boards would be handy. I have seen a couple of different designs from single pads to paired pads and some that even provide +5v and gnd paths around the board. While I am sure some of the pros and cons are obvious, perhaps I am missing some considerations.

For instance, right now I have some proto shields that include paired pads and routes for +5v an gnd. I think this is handy to connect components to one part of the paired pads and wires to the other. However I also see people using the pins of components to wrap hookup wires around to hold them in place until it is time to solder. What is your experience in choosing an appropriate shield proto board?

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Hi @Samper! Thank you for your reply. At this time there’s no mirror article for Arduino Mega shields. But here’s the options I see on the Digi-Key site for shields for the Arduino Mega: https://www.digikey.com/short/jjm25jzr. (Some of the shields were listed simply as compatible with “arduino.” I tried scrubbing the list as much as I could, but it’d be a good idea to double check any potentials to make sure the form factor is specific to the larger Mega boards)

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