Low-cost 12VDC to 120VAC inverter; no idea what frequency it produces. You would need an oscilloscope to get a true idea what this inverter really does.
I prefer to purchase new parts that have datasheets; it might cost me a bit of money but having all the details saves you a lot of time. Remember, time is money, too. All of my present nixie supplies are driven from the mains and they are NON-isolated. Just use an isolation transformer during debug & testing. I also recommend you use a voltage higher than 170V for nixies. Yes, they will fire at 170V, but as they age, their firing voltage will increase and you may not get reliable ignition. Another reason for using a higher voltage is that you will have less variation in the nixie current. Cathode current varies with supply-voltage, tube-condition, and even by digit. Using a higher voltage and a higher series resistor will reduce the variation in cathode current. If your supply is 170V, and the line-voltage drops by 6%, you will have a 33% reduction in tube current (brightness). If you run at 340VDC, a 6% drop in line voltage produces only a 7% drop in tube current. My latest designs use current-feedback on the cathodes, so it's literally constant-current. Since I'm in the US, our mains are 120V rms. Using a rectifier and capacitor gets you 170VDC. I use a doubler to get +340VDC, which is perfect. Tubes typically use 2mA, and have about 140V across them when lit, so a good starting value for 340VDC is 100K. R = (Vsupply-Vtube)/Itube. Use the recommended current from the datasheet, and measure the tube's actual voltage-drop for various digits, and take the average. Better yet, do this for all of your tubes. Nixies are damaged by excess current; higher voltage does not harm the nixie as long as you limit the current to a proper value. Using higher voltage does waste more energy, though. Someday I will make a constant-current driver that wastes no energy, but I'm too busy with the nixie wristwatch right now (pcb goes out for fab as soon as I finish my simulations) -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "neonixie-l" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/neonixie-l/2636b5c1-2f9c-4ff3-bf6d-60f6d1c525cf%40googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
