One of the things that this website doesn't have enough of is CRT / Oscilloscope clocks. Thankfully, I found an eBay seller who is happy to help fill the void. eBay seller al-truism has been selling scope clocks for a while and I've been watching them as his designs progress and he is offering them pretty regularly via eBay and directly from his website. For those who are a little more adventurous, he sells the board directly as a kit. His website has lots of great work and his YouTube channel shows the devices in action - go check it out.
From his site:
These oscilloscope clocks display a digital face for ten seconds and then an analog face for ten seconds. This helps to reduce the "burn-in" that otherwise will inevitably occur on crts displaying the same image for too long. Many of the parts are recycled from used electronics, which makes them kind of "green". The base and shroud are homemade from plexiglass. These scope clocks have a "shifter" that will move the display on the screen slightly every 6 seconds. Also , the display alternates every ten seconds between analog and digital face. This helps to greatly reduce the burn in that can result from the display staying in the same spot continuously. The Nixie clocks are "faders", which means when the numbers are changing, the number that's going is dimmed while the number that's coming is brightened. This produces a "morphing" effect that kind of makes them appear to melt into the next one. The oscilloscope clocks are user programmable with preset sleep / wake mode , which will turn the display on and off at preset times automatically, while still keeping time, thus conserving the crt usage and extending its lifespan.
I don't have much information on this device yet but I wanted to share it anyways:
Jean-Jacques Gorssens sent me a link to his amazing crt based clock. The clock is based on a PIC 16F648 microprocessor, a DS1337 realtime clock and a DS75 temperature sensor. What makes this clock different from any other that I've seen is that it also has room for an optional EEPROM to store frames for animation. The tube used in the videos and photos below is a DG7/32 but it supports other displays with minimal modification.
The font creation is done...using Open Office. Open Office Calc is used to define the points for each character and then output them in a format friendly format. Open Office is also used to convert 3D points in to a 2D projection and those points are added to the source code of the software and can then be used for display. He even wrote a program with LAZARUS allows for him to vectorize images and store them in the software for display. Be sure to watch the walking animation for a sample of the final product.
Additionally, Jean-Jacques provides the software for the PIC and the software needed for the animated 3D logo. The part list and schematics are available on his website. Even the fonts that he designed for his clock are available for others to use. (Thanks for sharing with the community!) Please be sure to visit his website for more detail - it is well worth the read!
http://goessens.dyndns.org/wiki/doku.php?id=crt_clock:clock
All images and video are owned by Jean-Jacques and used with permission. Videos re-hosted on Vimeo with premission for speed.
Dieter Wächter just published photos of his latest creation - the E1T beam deflection decade counting tube. Dieter has a lot of information on his website about how these devices work, data sheets, etc. Essentially, they are decade counting tubes that indicate a humber with a cyan line by the appropriate value printed on the tube. This thing is simply amazing - I have looked through my notes and research and I do not believe that there are any other six digit E1T clocks in existence.
The TubeClockDB / Tube Clock Database is a collection of nixie clocks, vfd clocks, vacuum fluorescent clocks, crt clocks, scope clocks and oscilloscope clocks. We will feature just about anything: fully assembled clocks ready to purchase, kits, or even individual nixie tubes. If there is something that you think would make this a better resource, please contact us.
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