What if....

[Nicholas Stock]

....they’d put a red filter on them???

[Dekatron42]

A lot nicer looking than the bare ones in my opinion!

/Martin

[jb-electronics]

They look incredible! Great job!

On 2019-07-07 1:15 p.m., Nicholas Stock wrote:

....they’d put a red filter on them???

Sent from my iPhone

[jf...@my-deja.com]

That's what I did: opaque black plexiglas for the sides and the ack, opaque white plexiglas for the top and bottom, and clear red for the front.  It gives it a mid-20th century modern or Bauhaus look with the digits floating inside the box instead of a steam-punk look, and emphasizes its function as a clock instead of showing off your hobby construction skills.  The red plexiglas is an excellent at producing nearly monochromatic red.

[Nicholas Stock]

For anyone else who's interested in doing this....here are a few tips (and photos). I used Pebeo Vitrail Glass Paint (transparent) in Crimson color, diluted 4 parts paint, 1 part mineral spirits. (250 mL costs about $20 bucks on Amazon).

Clean the tubes carefully with some rubbing alcohol (I used IPA) and let dry. Hang upside down using some crocodile clip leads over some poles or similar...(ignore the failed experiment with some violet paint and ZM1042's in the background .....they will be resurrected!).

Now's the tough part....find a vessel that doesn't take too much paint so that you can dip the tube in upside down to the right depth (you'll need a little dexterity to do this because of buoyancy of such a large tube, smaller ones are easier to deal with) then slowly lower the paint vessel whilst catching the drips. Note plenty of paper towel....You'll need to baby the tube for a while with some paper towel to wick off the drips that form on the bottom of the tube due to gravity, but these become less and less as the paint hardens....don't do it too late in the game otherwise the paint won't 'heal' and leave a smooth surface where you're wicking it from. 

The paint hardens quite quickly, but leave overnight (don't bother baking in the oven to make permanent, it's good enough as it and besides, I wouldn't recommend that for your nixies anyway....lol).

The finished article looks really really nice.

Of course, the same procedure is used for smaller nixies too. These are the largest I've done so far (no, I don't have any CD47's!!) and I'm very happy with how they came out. PM me if you need any more details.

Hope this helps someone.

Cheers,

Nick

On Sun, Jul 7, 2019 at 12:54 PM 'jf...@my-deja.com' via neonixie-l <neoni...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

That's what I did: opaque black plexiglas for the sides and the ack, opaque white plexiglas for the top and bottom, and clear red for the front.  It gives it a mid-20th century modern or Bauhaus look with the digits floating inside the box instead of a steam-punk look, and emphasizes its function as a clock instead of showing off your hobby construction skills.  The red plexiglas is an excellent at producing nearly monochromatic red.

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[martin martin]

That's an excellent time viewer!

[Kevin A.]

I see you stole my acrylic case idea ;) 

On Sun, Jul 7, 2019, 3:15 PM Nicholas Stock <nick...@gmail.com> wrote:

....they’d put a red filter on them???

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Sent from my iPhone

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[Nicholas Stock]

Ha ha! Had this one sitting in a cupboard for a couple years.....:-)

Still a great idea though! I like to see my electronics...

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<20190707_215420.jpg>

[H. Carl Ott]

Now that, is pretty neat. 

On Sun, Jul 7, 2019, 3:15 PM Nicholas Stock <nick...@gmail.com> wrote:

....they’d put a red filter on them???

[martin martin]

I just bought these 6 on the Bay. Came with a nice red coating (not as nice as we see) but I'll still build a clock as they are..

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Z573M-nixie-tubes-NOS-Lot-of-6-pcs/283504747766?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649

~

mcve...@gmail.com

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[Matthew]

Magnificent!

The only time that I use a cover over the tubes is to protect the red coating from possible damage due to cleaning or being out in
the open.  If the tubes are just glass, then I omit the cover and just dust off the tubes when they get dusty.  Although, if the red
coating is "easily" replaceable, then having a cover is completely unnecessary.

I prefer Dalibor's colon tubes.  They are probably (I do not have one yet) a better match, and probably last longer than the tiny
neon bulbs used with other clocks.  I noticed significant blackening on the tiny neon tubes that I run.

Dalibor wrote about developing a red filter on 10/12/2017, but had brightness issues.  I wonder if Nicholas' filter solves that problem.

On 07/07/2019 03:15 PM, Nicholas Stock wrote:
> ....they’d put a red filter on them???
>
>
>
>

> Sent from my iPhone
>

[MichaelB]

Nice idea, Nick!

On Sunday, July 7, 2019 at 6:19:45 PM UTC-7, Pramanicin wrote:

For anyone else who's interested in doing this....here are a few tips (and photos). I used Pebeo Vitrail Glass Paint (transparent) in Crimson color, diluted 4 parts paint, 1 part mineral spirits. (250 mL costs about $20 bucks on Amazon).

Clean the tubes carefully with some rubbing alcohol (I used IPA) and let dry. Hang upside down using some crocodile clip leads over some poles or similar...(ignore the failed experiment with some violet paint and ZM1042's in the background .....they will be resurrected!).

Now's the tough part....find a vessel that doesn't take too much paint so that you can dip the tube in upside down to the right depth (you'll need a little dexterity to do this because of buoyancy of such a large tube, smaller ones are easier to deal with) then slowly lower the paint vessel whilst catching the drips. Note plenty of paper towel....You'll need to baby the tube for a while with some paper towel to wick off the drips that form on the bottom of the tube due to gravity, but these become less and less as the paint hardens....don't do it too late in the game otherwise the paint won't 'heal' and leave a smooth surface where you're wicking it from. 

The paint hardens quite quickly, but leave overnight (don't bother baking in the oven to make permanent, it's good enough as it and besides, I wouldn't recommend that for your nixies anyway....lol).

The finished article looks really really nice.

Of course, the same procedure is used for smaller nixies too. These are the largest I've done so far (no, I don't have any CD47's!!) and I'm very happy with how they came out. PM me if you need any more details.

Hope this helps someone.

Cheers,

Nick

On Sun, Jul 7, 2019 at 12:54 PM 'jf...@my-deja.com' via neonixie-l <neoni...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

That's what I did: opaque black plexiglas for the sides and the ack, opaque white plexiglas for the top and bottom, and clear red for the front.  It gives it a mid-20th century modern or Bauhaus look with the digits floating inside the box instead of a steam-punk look, and emphasizes its function as a clock instead of showing off your hobby construction skills.  The red plexiglas is an excellent at producing nearly monochromatic red.

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