I encountered them while studying at Warsaw University of Technology. There are still dozens of Meratronik multimeters being used there - mostly because these are really idiot-proof and students won't destroy them :) Having a manual range setting is also a bonus, because students can learn about how the measurement is actually done. I doubt that the 5-digit display was still useful, as these probably weren't calibrated for years. I instantly fell in love with the orange glow and the way the digits are not in one plane. I didn't know how these were called, but then... I've got a message from my friend, that one of the institutes will be disposing old equipment. It was not working as intended, but the displays were mostly intact. I literally carried as much as I was able to carry - a V-541, a PFL-21 and three C549As. I didn't yet know which tubes are more worthy, if I had the knowledge, I would take another C549A instead of PFL-21 ;) Since then I am collecting tubes like a maniac - I snipe on internet auctions alot and visit local scrap electronics market regularly (that's where real deals can be found). I'm still studying and working at the same time, so I made only one clock so far, but I'm getting closer and closer to a solid base on STM32 microcontroller. Right now I own about 300 nixies waiting for better future as clocks.
W dniu niedziela, 4 lutego 2018 19:00:38 UTC+1 użytkownik SWISSNIXIE - Jonathan F. napisał: > > > I made this post to share my story how i found my way to nixie-tubes, and > i'm curious how everyone else came to this hobby :) > > My way to nixie tubes was a "double accidental". The very first encounter > with this type of tubes were around 2001 when i was around ~10-11 years > old, along my way to school there was a little local scrapyards, where me > and my friends used to go and collect all kind of materials for more and > less usefull constructions of electronic. One day we tear apart a old > calculator that had "strange looking number tubes" and we took a few of > them home, after a few tries to get them on with a lab power supply and the > few search request with the internet of that time didn't bring up anything > helpful, so the tubes ended up in a storage container, which ended back at > the scrap yard again.. > I never seen a vacuum or nixie tube again until 2013. At that time i > ordered a few GM-Tubes from a bulgarian seller on ebay, he put a few IN-12 > as a gift in the package. I instantly remembered my old scrapyard find, and > started to reseach these type of tubes just for curiousity. From there on i > fell in love with the typical orange glow that instantly remains of "old > age" (from my point of lifespan :-) ) and just looks very beautiful. I > quickly discovered that there are alot of different types of nixie tubes > around, so i started collecting them. I also started to find out more about > old electronic technology, and started to collect all kind of vacuum tubes > and circuits. About a year in collecting tubes and stuff i noticed that i > will run out of space.. so i had to decide to only collect nixie tubes > since they don't take up to much space. Today, 5 years later I own around > 240 different types of nixies with around 600 tubes total. > > Im very interested in how you got to the tubes, since there are a lot of > people here that have seen encountered nixies when they still were a normal > electronic part and not something considered rare or collectible. > > -- 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/6e6a7592-a9df-4270-bd8d-b3bd2116d917%40googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
