Show us your Nixie Clocks!

Seriously considering a nixie clock for the top of my gear cabinet and curious to see others setups with the nifty nixie.

Love these little things! Anyone have one?

SteamPunk Digital
Seriously Pricey though... count on ~$500 for a worth owning version.
Cheap ones use pencil thin/size type tubes.
Tubes need to be 3/4" or 1" diameter to be impressively intriguing... those are at a premium.. understandably.

bare said:

SteamPunk Digital
Seriously Pricey though... count on ~$500 for a worth owning version.
Cheap ones use pencil thin/size type tubes.
Tubes need to be 3/4" or 1" diameter to be impressively intriguing... those are at a premium.. understandably.

Click to expand...

Ridiculous!
Regular nixie clocks are much more reasonable -
tho there is always SOMEONE pushing high end prices
because - p.t.barnum ....

REALLY!?
then Post a link to a Nixie "kit' AND a set of 3/4" ~1'" tubes for LESS.. Please!

hjames said:

Ridiculous!
Regular nixie clocks are much more reasonable -
tho there is always SOMEONE pushing high end prices
because - p.t.barnum ....

Click to expand...

Really?
I recently sold a set of four Burroughs tubes untested and as-is for almost $350.

If you want tubes the size of your pinkie, you can get a clock "cheap".
If you want a real setup, you WILL have to pay for it.

This is >$100 each:
http://www.tube-tester.com/sites/nixie/data/b-7971/b7971.htm


This is <$5 each:


Big difference.

I have a few nixie clocks around here, though only one of them is currently working (and that's after several surgical operations). Here's the one which runs, which was offered as a kit by "B&F Enterprises" in the early '70s, based around 74xx-series TTL ICs. Whoever built it didn't do a great job, and I don't think the design was too great to begin with, but it's running quite well now. ***KNOCK ON WOOD***



Here's one of my project clocks, a homebrew of some sort from the '70s. Again, it uses TTL ICs, though mounted in perfboard and hand-wired. Unfortunately, someone stole the power transformer out of it at some point, so I have yet to test it.



I have several Heathkit clocks which technically don't use nixie tubes, but they use Sperry "Panaplex" digits which give a similar effect in 7-segment form. Similarly, I have several Numitron tubes which I'm planning to use to build a clock. Getting back on-topic, I also have some pieces of test equipment which uses nixie tubes, like a Hewlett-Packard 5245L frequency counter (which I'll likely keep as-is), and an Acton Labs 330A "Digital Phasemeter", which I'm considering turning into a clock.

I'd love to see a well-executed copy of a"big" nixie tube in LED form.
That would be cool to have some of the look without the hassles.

This one uses IN-18 tubes - 40mm digit height. It's been running trouble-free for three years now.

Not the best picture but I've got a 4 tube nixie o my desk at work (see attached)

robgmn said:

I'd love to see a well-executed copy of a"big" nixie tube in LED form.
That would be cool to have some of the look without the hassles.

Click to expand...

This is the closest I've seen thus far:

http://www.tubeclockdb.com/forum/Builders-Forum/2956-Edgelit-Reloaded.html

Technically, it's trying to emulate a different type of display, but it looks pretty nixie-like to me. Not sure if he's managed to do anything with the technology as of yet; I haven't found it on his website.
-Adam

Mine. IN-8 tubes.

Nice thread - my electronic display clock is technically not a NIXIE, but most likely VFD tubes from the 1970s. I found it at a local estate sale last Fall.

1koolcat has 1koolclock

I built one from a kit a few years back:



The housing was a separate affair sold by another company. I also had to source my own tubes.