Most of my clocks use non-isolated AC-line voltage for the anode supply; as long as you follow good design and safety practices, you will end up with a reliable and more-efficient design compared to DCDC converters and transformers.
It's very important to have properly-sized fuses, PCB traces, and wiring. Also, proper spacing, insulation, and warning labels (Hopefully my clocks will outlive me and someone will be taking care of them in the next century). Lastly, filtering from AC-line spikes and surge-protection. My first nixie clock has 4000-series CMOS gates tied to the AC line, and they have worked flawlessly for years. This was a design challenge I had wanted to do for many years; I knew it was theoretically possible but I had to prove it for myself. There are several stages of filtering, so the logic gates never see any of the ugliness that exists on the AC line at the wall-outlet. There are billions of devices that have circuitry running on the AC line without transformer protection; think of LED and CFL bulbs, and the input-side of laptop/cellphone power adapters. Not to mention the older tube-based radio/stereo/TV sets with hot-chassis. And most of these have UL, CE, etc recognition. ----------------------------------------------- Thanks for posting the 73 magazine; there's a certain magic about electronics from that era that doesn't exist anymore. Part of it is that you could touch, feel, and understand just about anything electronic back then. Not true today. -- 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/a9b1c28e-747f-4e28-97e1-a50df47190a1%40googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
