Loved the clock my dad had at his work in commercial radio. I always wanted one for myself.
Eventually, I started researching and found that Nixie clocks have a bit of a cult following. Around y2k the microcontroller industry hadn’t invented things like Arduino and ESP32, so kits were limited to those willing to build a kit from scratch. In the end, I settled on a clock from www.tubehobby.com. Around the same time, I grabbed a few IN12 tubes and then sat on everything. Work\life lowered the priority of my tinkering and so my interest in electronics parked for a while.
In the winter of 2022 I decided to take a course in prep for my HAM advanced license – this is essentially a radio-focused electronics course so my old electronics interest was piqued and I started digging out all the old stuff and decided now was the time.
Nixie Driver Project: As I was going through my supplies, I found the IN12 tubes I had been holding on to. I already had so many other clock-like projects, I wanted to do something different. I am not sure WHAT yet – all I know was that I didn’t want to be limited to a clock kit, but rather something modular, and can be controlled by an Arduino, ESP32, etc…
Elekstube: During my online research, I came across and impulse-bought an IPS Elekstube near-nixie-look clock. Given this thing has an ESP32 on board, there are options to explore.