Kopriso Nixie Watch third glimpse

[Cobra007]

Programming is almost done!
There are 9 settings that the user can change according to his/her
preference. This is related to tube brightness, time format, rotation
speed, power saving modes and sensor sensitivity. Additionally, there
are 2 settings for calibration of the RTCC to fine tune it down to
about 2.5sec per month. It also incorporates a 16 bit counter that
increments at every time trigger. Battery should last for more than
20,000 triggers under normal circumstances.

http://youtu.be/n7NGRoVZfIY

Michel

[Cobra007]

All done!

I probably need to polish the software here and there to remove traces
of debugging and add a bit more comment so that I can still find out
what I was thinking in about 10 years from now. But overall,
everything works.

I added the following parameters that the user can change to their own
preference:
P01 : 12/24hr format [0=24hr, 1=12hr]
P02 : Maximum brightness [0=25%, 1=50%, 2=75%, 3=100%]
P03 : Brightness [0=constant, 1=ambient, 2=ambient+3dB, 3=ambient+6dB]
P04 : Time format [0=hh/mm, 1=hh/mm/ss, 2=hh/mm/ss + 5 seconds real
time, 3=hh/mm continuously with 5 second delays]
P05 : Rotation speed [0=fast, 1, 2, 3=slow]
P06 : Motion sensor disable [0=always, 1=after 2hrs, 2=after 4hrs,
3=never]
P07 : Power saving mode [0=sleep, 1=deep sleep]
P08 : Tube brightness in low ambient light [0=+0, 1=+2, 2=+4 3=+8]
P09 : Motion sensor range [0=6cm, 1, 2, 3=2cm]
P10 : Calibration register increment
P11 : Calibration register decrement

Michel

[Lucky]

Great Michel, looking fine I must say congrats on your hard work. Will be interesting to see the case/strap you design for it.

[Cobra007]

Thanks Dave,

It's a bit of a struggle doing my own work and the nixie watch in my
spare time. I would really like to see it in it's case, but I know for
a fact I'll be very busy next week. Still, I'll give it my best shot.

Michel

[Dekatron42]

Nice!

I wish there where small enough Nixies to make a four digit watch the
same (or smaller) size! If it would have been possible to make the
counting logic with small dekatrons I would have paid anything to get
one!

/Martin

[Cobra007]

Thanks Martin,

It is of course technically possible to use dekatrons, but are there
any that are small enough for use as a wrist watch? Also, to make it
worth the effort, you need quite a stash of those tubes, I mean it
doesn't really make sense to spend all this time designing it and then
only have enough tubes for 10 watches :-).

Another possible problem could be the brightness of the tube cathodes.
The dekatron only lights up only a small dot rather than a whole
digit.
I like the idea though!

Michel

[Dekatron42]

Ohh, I would go for just one watch if I had the parts, mass production
has never been my focus as I just do these thingd for fun and because
I can.

I guess that the Burroughs Self Scan design is the smallest "dekatron"-
like object there is, I have not seen anything similar from any other
manufacturer. It would however need some re-design to work as a true
dekatron with output cathodes if you'd like to drive a Nixie from it,
otherwise a combined design with a Dekatron and the ZM1050 (Z550M)
"pixie" would have been nice too.

The smallest dekatrons, to my knowledge, with output cathodes which
could drive a Nixie via a transistor is probably the ZM1170 / Z504S
types which come in a 13 pin B13B socket, the same socket that ZM1040
Nixies use. The smallest ones, to my knowledge, which you can use to
drive a Nixie with directly are the GSA10G / GCA10G (similar designs
are Z572S / Z573C). I'm making a clock with the GSA10G's but it is
really slow progress as my family and work takes most of my time.

/Martin

[Cobra007]

Nice tubes, had a look at some on youtube. They still seem relatively
large. If there was a dekatron that would fit inside a B4998 envelope
it would more appealing.

I think family and work is for most of us the reason why projects take
more time than initially planned :-) I usually start too many projects
at the same time because I want to try out all of them :-)

Michel

[threeneurons]

On Friday, May 11, 2012 3:50:20 PM UTC-7, Cobra007 wrote:

Nice tubes, had a look at some on youtube. They still seem relatively
large. If there was a dekatron that would fit inside a B4998 envelope

it would more appealing.  ...

Michel

There's the A108 group (A107, A108, & A109).

 http://www.decadecounter.com/vta/articleview.php?item=744

They're as small as an IN-2. Only problem, is that they're divide-by-5, not divide-by-10.

[Cobra007]

Yeah, I can see potential in that one. But how can you turn that into
a clock? It would have been great if it had 12 segments rather than
10. Otherwise you need 1 tube for each digit and some form of face
plate to show the number it actually represents.

Michel

[AnubisTTP]

The obvious solution is to geek out completely and make a dekatron
watch that tells time in metric! Use two A108s and divide the day into
10 hours of 100 minutes, then have the first tube display hours and
the second 10s of minutes. Sure, nobody is going to be able to read
the thing, but once you get to the point where you are seriously
talking about building a dekatron-based watch, I think all hope of
having a practical device has been thrown out the window already.

Ultimately building a dekatron watch is to doable though, to really
break people's brains you are going to have to build a watch out of
direct view beam switching tubes.

http://www.decadecounter.com/vta/articleview.php?item=1090

If someone manages to actually pull that off, they could probably
somehow tap their own lack of sanity as a power source...

[Cobra007]

I am missing the "I like this" button on Google groups :-)

Michel

[Dekatron42]

> If someone manages to actually pull that off, they could probably
> somehow tap their own lack of sanity as a power source...

Then maybe all of us in here should be able to run that clock on our
own power..... ;)

I love the RYG10, would have been fantastic to have a clock/watch with
those!

I completely forgot about the Russian A107/8/9 series, maybe something
can be done with those mounted on the side with a mirror and a mask
only letting the glow through tiny holes.....

/Martin