Nixie Tube Clock ‘SixNix’
Issue 5 (14 August 2012)
www.pvelectronics.co.uk
- 3 -
1. INT
RODUCTION
1.1
About the clock
Nixie clock type ‘SixNix’ is a compact design with all components and
tubes mounted on a single PCB. The efficient use of board space is
achieved by using a multiplex design to drive the display tubes. Only a
single high-voltage binary-to-decimal decoder IC (74141) is required,
and each tube is switched on in sequence very quickly to give the illusion
that all the tubes are actually lit.
The clock is designed for tube type IN-16.
1.2
Clock Features
Nixie clock type ‘SixNix' has the following features:
- Hours, Minutes and Seconds display
- 12 or 24 hour modes
- Date display in either DD.MM.YY or MM.DD.YY format
- Alarm, with programmable snooze period
- Programmable date display each minute
- Attractive LED tube lighting
- Uses a Quartz Crystal Oscillator as the timebase
- Optional DCF / WWVB / MSF / GPS synchronisation with status indicator
LED
- Supercapacitor backup. Keeps time during short power outages
- Simple time setting using two buttons
- Programmable leading zero blanking
- Five programmable neon colon settings (Flashing AM/PM indication,
illuminated AM/PM indication, both flashing, both on, both off)
- Maintains time during setup mode, eg. When changing between
Standard Time and Daylight Savings Time
- Seconds can be reset to zero to precisely the set time
- Programmable night mode - blanked or dimmed display to save tubes
or prevent sleep disturbance
- Separate modes for colon neons during night mode
- Standard or fading change of digits
- ‘Slot Machine’ Cathode poisoning prevention routine
- All user preferences stored to non-volatile memory
