New Nixe Tube Clock Bot

[robothut]

Thanks to Henks origional design and the new repro chief robots I was able to design my own version of the nixie clock bot. I made mine in a distressed copper finnish and used 6 russian end view nixie tubes.

Henks 2005 nixie clock robot can be seen here.

http://danefield.com/alpha/forums/index.php?showtopic=3456

Here is a short You tube video of the new Nixie tube clock bot.

[robothut]

The clock can be set for 12 or 24 hour display and has 2 alarm modes as well. A 2 AAA battery back up for the clock time is provided and the set switchs are on the back. The clock runs on a external 9 volt power supply. The robot still has bump and go action and flashing eyes that run on 2 AA batterys .

[robothut]

There is also a neon light in the head that lights when the nixie tubes are ON.

The hours are the top tubes and the minuts are just below. The seconds are in the two vent windows. No one uses second on a house clock these days unless they are bidding on Ebay anway.

[robothut]

Learning all I could from Henks comments from his project I set out to make as much room in the body as possible. So I used the bump and go drive from a old R-1 robot as its alot lower in profile and I removed the 2 D cell battery box in favor of a new one that held 2 AA batterys for the bump and go drive and flashing lights in the head and 2 AAA batterys for the clock backup.

[robothut]

I bought the nixie clock kit from a seller in the UK. The 6 nixie tubes have to have wires added to there tube pins to extend them to the driver board. The hard part of this is that each tube has 12 contact pins and there are 6 tubes. That is a bunch of wires!

[robothut]

Here is the bottom circuit board being fitted into the body. The upper board is the nixie driver board and it is the same size.

[robothut]

This picture shows the wires from the nixie tubes to the driver board. The second pixture shows how I sealed the wires with hot melt glue where they solder to the tubes and the circuit board. There is 170 volts DC driving those tubes but mainly I wanted to be sure that non of the wires would break off durring final assembly.

[robothut]

The distressed copper finnish was done in 4 steps. First is the primer coat, then a coat of hammer finnish. This gives the surface a texture. Then a coat of bright copper paint and finnaly a black wash to fill in the low parts of the paint effect. The non copper parts were done the same way only chrom paint was used instead of the copper paint.

[robothut]

More pictures.

The nixie clock kit after pounds to dollers was about $100 bucks and you still have to buy your own regulated power supply so thats another $15 bucks. Then add in the cost of the repro chief type robot and well its not a cheep conversion to do but it sure looks cool!

Here is a link to a page on the robot at my site as well.

http://www.robothut.robotnut.com/NixieClockBotPage.html

[Roboto]

Great conversion. This robot looks tightly packed inside. Love the copper finish I wish MH would make a finish like this on a run of robots. The video turned out great. :)

You have a fantastic Nixe Tube Clock Robot.

[Electric Robot and Son]

Wow John, that is an amazing creation. I don't think conversion really applies to this one. You really packed a lot of wires and batteries into a really small space. Thumbs up on the copper finish too.

[roboz]

Beautiful job !

The visor lense matches the Nixie tubes

Color is fantastic & the fact that you kept the bump & go

WOW !!

[Andyman]

Well done, Mr. Rigg. I can appreciate the wiring job there. I once resoldered a connector on a pro camera cable for a friend. You have patience my friend.

[robothut]

Thanks Andy, back when I was young and I could see small things with out the aid of different glasses "oh those were the days" I used to build and repair audio and lighting cables for Rock bands , recording studios and stage shows, one of those military grade connectors would have twice as many wires too solder on to little pins all packed tightly together. So it could have been worse.

[Dirk]

WOW - JOHN! JUST EXTRATERRESTIAL! I know the original NIXIEBOT, that Henk made. CLAUS is the happy owner of that one - and originally it was his idea. And Henk was crazy enough to agree to make that job for Claus / Hotbotz. Your NIXIEBOT has a very special appeal - I love them both! :wub: