The Bulbdial clock from Evil Mad Scientist is probably the coolest clock idea I’ve ever seen. Even cooler are my parents, who got the kit for my birthday. The basic idea is that three rings of LEDs cast shadows onto a clock face to form H/M/S hands, somewhat like a sundial, with the hands slowly animating around. A lot of thought clearly went into making this kit, and it’s very nicely done, but there’s a major drawback: I want to use it on my bed side table, where I usually keep a clock, but it’s too bright for me to fall asleep! Of course, that’s been thought of too: in the normal view mode, the three buttons at the bottom of the clock are brightness up, down, and “mute,” which turns off the LEDs entirely. But they’re hard to get to buried underneath the frame of the clock, and it makes muting the display cumbersome in the dark. Let’s fix that!
The Bulbdial Clock kit is based on an original design concept from IronicSans.com and developed at Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories. It works like an indoor sundial, but with three shadows of different length. You tell the time just like you do on a normal clock, by reading the positions of the hour, minute, and second hands.
The Bulbdial we are carrying comes with red, green and blue LEDs for the ‘hands’, a black/smoke laser-cut enclosure and a wall adapter. When finished, it looks like the picture shown above!
The Bulbdial Clock is sold as a soldering kit [?]. Basic electronic soldering skill is required, and you provide basic soldering tools: a soldering iron + solder and small wire clippers. You will also need internet access to read or download our detailed assembly guide. No additional knowledge of electronics is presumed or required. Easy “through-hole” construction and clear, photo-heavy instructions are provided. Assembly time: 1-3 hours, depending on your level of experience with soldering.
MonoChron-Beta-0-6. That was only yesterday at 3:30, And we’re already a couple more revs down the road. The code is stable, We’re just bug hunting. MonoChron is an OpenSource Hardware solution from LadyAda of AdaFruit.Com. I created the IntruderChron variant of the clock, and LadyAda has created 3 additional variants. The firmware is difficult to load, and only one could be loaded at a time. The MultiChron solution is to combine all 4 variants into one firmware load, and allow the user to select, randomize, or rotate through the variants. This project is documented on the Clock forum at Adafruit.Com with the full knowledge of LadyAda and AdaFruit. This software is distributed under Creative Commons, and extended as such. My involvement has been to design and implement the software effort. I have been aided by CaithSith2 and have credited such in the About screen. Music is Tropic of Capri by Vladimir Jan Rebek (BMI) of freeroyaltyfreemusic.net. Thank you for the use of your music.
Phillip and Limor of Adafruit and MAKE were kind enough to send me one of their Monochron clock kits, because they ported Dali Clock to it! I just finished building it, so now I have a hardware Dali Clock. It is sweet.
Fun hack for the Ice Tube clock! Who doesn’t want satellite-precise timing? This firmware mod allows you to add any 4800 TTL NMEA GPS module. Check that the module can run from 5V power, and has a wire that outputs NMEA 4800 baud at TTL levels. Do NOT use any RS-232 level outputs, they can easily damage your clock!
Our favorite Soviet-Era display that found its way into a present-day kit now displays time from orbiting satellites. A GPS module patched into an Ice Tube Clock with modified firmware will be able to provide a satellite-synced time. The firmware, modified by yours truly, parses the GPS module’s NMEA RMC sentences for the time and date information and then updates the clock’s time and date. Fun was had making sure the alarm went off at the correct times when the time was updated by the GPS. Overall, it was a fun project and we look forward to seeing additional Ice Tube Clock hacks.
We picked up a few of these now-discontinued GPS modules specifically for those that want to use them for time-keeping purposes. They use an older chipset and our testing determined that while they function perfectly fine as a GPS, they are not as accurate as the EM-406 modules we carry for location applications. For that reason, we don’t suggest them for location logging.
This is a great battery-backed real time clock (RTC) that allows your microcontroller project to keep track of time even if it is reprogrammed, or if the power is lost. Perfect for datalogging, clock-building, time stamping, timers and alarms, etc. The DS1307 is the most popular RTC, and works best with 5V-based chips such as the Arduino.
All parts including PCB, header and battery are included
Quick to assemble and use
Plugs into any breadboard, or you can use wires
We have example code and library for Arduino with a walkthrough on our documentation page
The DS1307 is simple and inexpensive but not a high precision device. It may lose or gain up to 2 seconds a day. For a high-precision, temperature compensated alternative, please check out the ChronoDot.
Dekatron clock with IN-18 nixies. No logic and No Microcontroller. John found a great dekatron based Nixie clock on YouTube that I wanted to re-post here. All of the timing is derived from the mains line at 50Hz. The dekatrons divide the time base in to seconds, minutes, and hours. I’ve contacted owner and others have as well to see how he performs the “divide by 5″ function to get 1pps and the “divide by 6″ to convert 60 seconds in to a minute. You can see the jump/division happen at 1:20 seconds in the video. I am not sure if this is simply a matter of wiring the dekatrons differently or there are other components in use that are not visible.
Reader Albert Y. from Seattle, Washington sent in his latest creation. It is a scope clock based off of the Thiem-Work components. He was helped by Eric C. both in vision and execution. It has a similar styling with the exposed CRT and the (what appears to be) aluminum base. Nice work!
Cool glowing blue tube with 8 digits, PM dot and alarm on/off indicator
Adjustable brightness
Alarm with volume adjust
Precision watch crystal keeps time with under 20ppm (0.0002%) error (< 2 seconds a day)
Clear acrylic enclosure protects clock from you and you from clock
Battery backup will let the clock keep the time for up to 2 weeks without power
Selectable 12h or 24h display
Displays day and date on button press
10 minute snooze
Integrated boost converter so it can run off of standard DC wall adapters, works in any country regardless of mains power
Great for desk or night table use, the clock measures 4.9″ x 2.9″ x 1.3″ (12.5cm x 7.4cm x 3.3cm)
Completely open source hardware and software, ready to be hacked and modded!
Complete kit comes with a 110/220V 9VDC power supply (a $1 plug adapter from your local hardware store will allow it to be used worldwide), all components including PCB, vacuum fluorescent tube, backup battery and a clear acrylic enclosure. Assembly is required! This kit is made of through-hole components but is best built by someone with previous soldering experience as there are many parts and steps.
For assembly instructions, user manual, code, schematics, and more, please visit the Ice Tube Clock webpage!
**Note: This kit is super popular, and the supply of tubes is harder to get. Thus the price is going to increase slowly but surely until the tubes are unavailable & the kit is discontinued. Thanks for your understanding!
The Bulbdial Clock kit is based on an original design concept from IronicSans.com and developed at Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories. It works like an indoor sundial, but with three shadows of different length. You tell the time just like you do on a normal clock, by reading the positions of the hour, minute, and second hands.
The bulbdial we are carrying comes with red, green and blue LEDs for the ‘hands’, a black/smoke laser-cut enclosure and a wall adapter. When finished, it looks like the picture shown above!
The Bulbdial Clock is sold as a soldering kit [?]. Basic electronic soldering skill is required, and you provide basic soldering tools: a soldering iron + solder and small wire clippers. You will also need internet access to read or download our detailed assembly guide. No additional knowledge of electronics is presumed or required. Easy “through-hole” construction and clear, photo-heavy instructions are provided. Assembly time: 1-3 hours, depending on your level of experience with soldering.
This one actually does have filaments. There are 12 light bulbs per digit; one for each numeral, and two for decimal points (left and right). These are neat little display modules that were made by a company called IEE (Industrial Electronic Engineers) way back before 7-segment LEDs were invented. Each light bulb sits behind a clear printed slide with the corresponding number printed on it in negative (the number is clear and the background is black), and in front of the slide is an array of tiny lenses. When a light bulb turns on, it projects an image of the number through the lens and onto the back of the lightly frosted plastic at the front of the display module. The Vintage Technology Association has a great exploded view so you can get a better idea of how this works.
The clock itself is fairly pedestrian although this design uses a quadrature encoder (the black knob on the upper right) to set the time. Instead of pushing on a button and waiting while the numbers slowly tick by, it’s much easier to just spin a knob.
Keeping time is the function of a DS3231 IC. The display is not multiplexed. A multiplexed display would involve a lot of diodes which would dissipate quite a bit of heat, and for this design, I use 6 ULN2003 driver ICs connected to 2 MAX7300 GPIO expanders. Technically I used devices that are pin compatible with the ULN2003 since nobody seemed to have any in stock. The microprocessor is a PIC18F2420 which communicates with the DS3231 and both MAX7300 devices using I2C.
Printable catalog (PDF) or (EPUB)
