NumiQueen IV-13 clock review

[Ian Sparkes]

Hi all,

I have just published a review of the NumiQueen IV-13 clock at https://www.tubeclockdb.com/ which is the first Numitron clock that I have owned. All in all I was very impressed with the clock.

Interested to hear your comments!

Ian

[gregebert]

Special emphasis here on the constant-current source mentioned in the review, which is an excellent way to lengthen incandescent tube life. You can actually see the warm-up latency from the video in the ones-second digit; it looks similar to cross-fading.

[Mark Moulding]

I've built quite a few Numitron clocks, most with the common (and inexpensive) IV-9 tubes, but a couple with the large, attractive *top-view* RCA DTF-104B tubes (which are pretty rare now).  I'm currently working on a pocket watch using the diminutive Minitron displays (about the size of an 8-pin DIP).

My clocks use an 8051-derivative processor, direct-drive using 74HC595 shift registers.  It was a bit of a pain, but to extend the life of the tubes, I keep all of the filaments heated even when visibly "off".  The "on" segments are heated to whatever the desired brightness is, using a look-up table for a PWM ratio of 3:32 to 1:1 (the perceived brightness is very non-linear to the actual on/off ratio).  The off segments are excited with a 1:32 ratio, which is just below the point of a visible glow - in a completely dark room, after my eyes have dark-adapted, I can just barely see a dull glow from the "off" segments.  I hadn't thought of using current limiting during the initial warm-up, though...

Note that even without this sort of gentle treatment, these tubes have very long life-spans.  The US tubes (RCA Numitrons, Apollo IEE-series, or the Minitrons) all have a specified life expectancy of 100,000 hours at full drive voltage, and it goes up dramatically from there at lower drive voltages.  Also, they're surprisingly rugged mechanically: rated peak acceleration *during operation* of 100g, and continuous operation with 20g vibration from 5-500 Hz - these things were designed to be installed in fighter jets.  Add in the fact they're readable in direct sunlight, and one can see why it's only been in the last decade or so that the Minitron displays are finally disappearing from airplane cockpits.

~~
Mark Moulding

[Ian Sparkes]

I'm still handling them with kid gloves! I just can't seem to get it into my head that they are pretty robust little beasts!

Please let me know if you spot any untruths or errors in the article, I don't have a lot of experience with these things. Or much else either... :-D

Ian

[rmp]

I have some of the 104 top-view tubes I'd like to use. Any details of your clock design using these you'd care to share?

[Ian Sparkes]

Not my design! It's from Jürgen at NixieKits.eu. I am only responsible for the the review, not the device!

TubeClockDB is there as a sort of "Magazine Format" resource for the community. The focus is on more in depth discussions and features, a sort of broad cut of what's going on across the tube world. It also built up a fair number of reviews while Brian was still running it, and I took over at the end of last year and have continued to add stuff.

I'm doing my best to keep something interesting on the front page, plus doing all the learning about video production. (Very steep uphill learning curve).

If someone has something that they'd like to contribute (i.e. show off), I'll happily do the editorial stuff. I know Mitch is working on something, and I have a few things lined up.

It doesn't have to be a review, (although they are probably the the easiest thing to do), it could also be a personal journey piece (e.g. Nixiebunnie's Watch Saga) or something more technical.

[Mike Mitchell]

 

I recently came across some numitrons used in aircraft displays. They are .3" digit in molded back plastic. 

Two small screws hold them together, so I took one apart. One half is light pipes for the segments, the other is a socket for seven grain-of-wheat bulbs. Each bulb is 5v 20ma.

The back has eight color-coded wires, one common (black), the rest go to the segment bulbs.

I haven't figured out what I want to do with them yet.

[gregebert]

How many displays do you have ?

You could build a box with all of the displays , controlled by a WiFi-equipped RasPi , then send it messages from your computer (time-of-day, temperature, stock prices, etc...)

[alb.001 alb.001]

these are light-pipe grain of wheat lamp type displays no truly Numitrons

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[Mike Mitchell]

On Tuesday, February 14, 2017 at 10:06:35 AM UTC-5, gregebert wrote:

How many displays do you have ?

You could build a box with all of the displays , controlled by a WiFi-equipped RasPi , then send it messages from your computer (time-of-day, temperature, stock prices, etc...)

I already built a box like that using .56" 14-segment displays. I used a teensy and an ESP8266, along with a BLE module to change settings.

 

[Ben W]

Mike...that looks simply awesome!! It leaves me itching to put a smoked glass or darkened acrylic over that display though...it would increase contrast so beautifully...perhaps just my taste.

[M1]

Mike,

Did you ever make the code/assembly public?   I would be interested in getting one or making one myself.

On Wednesday, February 15, 2017 at 5:53:37 AM UTC-8, Mike Mitchell wrote:

[krisiluttinen]

Hello lads,

Wow, I love this. Any details on parts and source  code?

On Nov 19, 2019, at 1:49 PM, M1 <mich...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Michail Wilson]

Ok,

 

There is/was an 'Art Contest' in Bitcointalk.  So, I submitted my entry, although I didn't have time to do anything really cool.

My post is:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5193860.msg53143508#msg53143508

 

The short video is:

https://youtu.be/qcuYOATEeP4

 

Several imgur pictures:

https://imgur.com/a/C2VZksM

 

I just want to say that I don't have an independent smartsocket driver yet, but...

I have the WeMos setup as a serial repeater.  So, hardware serial connected to the computer and repeated on the software serial connected to the smartsockets.  This was done because I was having issues with commands from the computer appearing not to go to the smartsocket.  It turns out I didn't have CR+NL (rage) which is needed for the sockets to accept the command.   I figured this out by resetting the WeMos and all of a sudden the sockets would THEN display the last command.  Since I already setup as a serial repeater, I decided to keep this so that I can have the controller interpret commands first before sending to the tubes.   

 

So...

The intent here is to have a WEB based device which can accept messages and/or feeds (news/twitter/etc) to have it either take pictures or video to be live streamed. 

(Basically similar to the eeberfest shoutbox.)

 

What I used for the display testing was Calculators and Text to Smartsockets:

Taylor Edge:

http://www.tayloredge.com/reference/Circuits/1386SmartSocket/index.html

http://www.tayloredge.com/utilities/vbapps/Installers/iCalculators.exe

 

Text to Smartsockets

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/smartsockets/files/Text%20to%20Smartsockets/

or

https://groups.io/g/smartsockets/files/Smartsocket%20Files/Text%20to%20Smartsockets

 

 

I welcome any suggestions or questions.

 

 

Michail Wilson

206-920-6312

.