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Howdy y'all;

I'm rather new to Nixies, however I've seen them before and I'm quite
enthralled with them. I've picked up some Burroughs B5092A's (From
what I can tell from one of their catalogs, a long-life
high-visibility one) for $4 a piece and am working on schematics for a
simple clock I want to build.

I guess my first major question is: Has anyone used KiCad to build
things with Nixies? If so, whats your experience? (good bad or
indifferent)

Second major question is /why is there a radioactivity symbol on
these?/ On all my little nixies there's a radioactive symbol next to
the name -- I can assume because they've got amounts of 85Kr in them
(according to the label on one).

Third, not so major question, is does anyone know of a source for
sockets? I dont want to have to solder new nixies every time one burns
out (though i have a hunch these wont given the power supply I'm going
to put them on).


And a little about me:

I'm a high school student in ABQ, dabble in hardware and software
(though my passion is applications, I love hardware stuff). I've been
soldering since I was 2, and am now better than my father (who
ironically is an embedded systems guy) except that I cant do surface
mount. I understand the basics of electronics and as long as I have
some sort of basis in reality I'm fairly good at figuring out what a
circuit does.



--
Morgan gangwere

“The future’s already arrived. It’s just not evenly distributed yet.”
William Gibson

--- In NEONIXIE-L@..., Morgan Gangwere <0.fractalus@...> wrote:
<snip>

I've picked up some Burroughs B5092A's (From what I can tell from
one of their catalogs, a long-life high-visibility one) for $4 a
piece and am working on schematics for a simple clock I want to
build.

<snip>

[W]hy is there a radioactivity symbol on these?/ On all my little
nixies there's a radioactive symbol next to the name -- I can
assume because they've got amounts of 85Kr in them
(according to the label on one).

Welcome to the group, Morgan! The 85Kr is present in a few nixie types to reduce what is known as the "dark effect". Several factors affect the time it takes a nixie to ionize and light up from cold, one of the more significant of which is the amount of ambient radiation (usually light). Manufacturers added a small amount of mildly radioactive Krypton gas as a source of ions to a few types, for use in situations where they might be required to light up immediately in dark locations. Most of the radiation produced by 85Kr is low-energy Beta, which can not penetrate glass. Also, the amount present is so low that you'd literally have to smash and inhale from thousands (perhaps millions?) of new tubes at once to have any significant increased risk of harm above that from everyday background radiation. Finally, the half-life of 85Kr is less than a decade, so those tubes now have less than a tenth the radioactivity that they did when they were made. So, nothing to worry about at all, really. The radioactivity labeling is only there because the U.S. government required it.

Third, not so major question, is does anyone know of a source for
sockets? I dont want to have to solder new nixies every time one
burns out

<snip>

Firstly, nixies with rigid pins should not be soldered, and you'd probably have a difficult time of it if you tried. Second, and most importantly, type B-5092-A uses one of the most common types of nixie sockets (13-pin round), which are fairly readily available from several sources usually including Jan Wuesten, Sphere Research, and Ebay. Properly driven nixie tubes (except the earliest types) can last for decades of continuous use, so you probably won't be doing much replacing anyway.

A.J.

On Wed, Dec 23, 2009 at 2:09 PM, A.J. <[email protected]> wrote:
8<----Snip--->8

The 85Kr is present in a few nixie types to reduce what is known as the "dark effect". Several factors affect the time it takes a nixie to ionize and light up from cold, one of the more significant of which is the amount of ambient radiation (usually light). Manufacturers added a small amount of mildly radioactive Krypton gas as a source of ions to a few types, for use in situations where they might be required to light up immediately in dark locations. Most of the radiation produced by 85Kr is low-energy Beta, which can not penetrate glass.

This is what I gathered from the various websites i've found with
them. I'm surprised dieter doesn't have pictures of them, given the
apparent commonality of these guys :)

Also, the amount present is so low that you'd literally have to smash and inhale from thousands (perhaps millions?) of new tubes at once to have any significant increased risk of harm above that from everyday background radiation. Finally, the half-life of 85Kr is less than a decade, so those tubes now have less than a tenth the radioactivity that they did when they were made. So, nothing to worry about at all, really. The radioactivity labeling is only there because the U.S. government required it.

Yeah I noticed that (Of course they could care less now at those low
values). I have a friend who has an oooold smoke detector that uses
Polonium or some such for co2 detection.

[snip]

Firstly, nixies with rigid pins should not be soldered, and you'd probably have a difficult time of it if you tried. Second, and most importantly, type B-5092-A uses one of the most common types of nixie sockets (13-pin round), which are fairly readily available from several sources usually including Jan Wuesten, Sphere Research, and Ebay. Properly driven nixie tubes (except the earliest types) can last for decades of continuous use, so you probably won't be doing much replacing anyway.

I searched and my thing is I dont want to have to order anything I
cant get at say my local Surplus outlet. I *have* socket headers I can
solder onto a board and I wrote me a script that generates the
locations of all the pins (given # pins including keys && size in mils
of the diameter of original socket). I'll go divulge myself of another
few surplus places to see but its looking grim. I mean my last-ditch
effort is I suck the socket leads out of a few connectors I have
laying around.

Also, for anyone curious I took some pictures of my found Nixies:



--
Morgan gangwere

“The future’s already arrived. It’s just not evenly distributed yet.”
William Gibson

Yeah I noticed that (Of course they could care less now at those low
values). I have a friend who has an oooold smoke detector that uses
Polonium or some such for co2 detection.

Cool, polonium is also used in anti-static brushes. These days, ionization style smoke detectors use americium. I'm looking for an ooooold americium one for my element collection, as americium has a shortish half-life, and a really old unit would be mostly neptunium by now.

- John