Collaborate Disseminate
Often with more “modern” complex protocols involving handshaking, token exchanges, and all the other hoops and whistles accompanying them, we forget how useful and powerful serial can be. In what …read more Continue reading A Simple Serial Display
The PC turbo button and LED clock speed display were common features on early personal computers. Wanting to add a little retro chic to his modern battle-station, [Matthew Frost] assembled …read more Continue reading Turbo Button Pays Charming Homage To Early Personal Computers
Large mechanical seven-segment displays have a certain presence that you just don’t get in electronic screens. Part of this comes from the rather satisfying click-click-clack sound they make at every …read more Continue reading Silent Stepper Motors Make Electromechanical Clock Fit For a Living Room
Computers, from the simplest to the most complex, aren’t very useful if they can’t provide feedback to a user. Whether that interface takes the form of a monitor, a speaker, …read more Continue reading Three-Dimensional Design Yields Compact Seven-Segment Hex Displays
When we think of 7-segment displays as the ubiquitous LED devices that sprung into popularity in the 1970s. However, numbers have existed for a lot longer than that, and people …read more Continue reading Incandescent 7-Segment Displays Are Awesome
A staple of consumer devices for decades, seven segment displays are arguably one of the most recognizable electronic components out there. So it’s probably no surprise they’re cheap and easy to source for our own projects. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t room for personal interpretation.
[MacCraiger] wanted to build …read more
Continue reading Huge Seven Segment Display Made From Broken Glass
When [Patrick Hickey] spent a tidy sum on eBay to purchase a pair of seven-segment displays used in the Launch Control Center at Kennedy Space Center during the Apollo program, he could have just put them up on a shelf. It’s certainly what most people would have done. Instead, he’s …read more
Continue reading Preserving Historic NASA Display Technology
[Peter Lehnér] has designed a brilliant 7-segment flip-segment display that doesn’t really flip. In fact, it doesn’t use electromagnets at all. This one is 3D printed and hand cranked. It’s a clever use of a cam system to set the segments for each digit (0-9) makes it a perfect entry in the Hackaday 3D Printed Gears, Pulleys, and Cams contest.
We find the nomenclature of these displays to be a bit confusing so let’s do a quick rundown. You may be most familiar with flip-dot displays, basically a dot-matrix grid of physical pixels that are black on one side and …read more
Continue reading 7-Segment Display is 3D Printed and Hand Cranked
This looks like one of those projects that started out as a glimmer of an idea and led down a rabbit hole. But it’s a pretty cool rabbit hole that leads to homebrew neon seven-segment displays on a calculator with relay logic.
It’s a little thin on documentation so far, but that’s because [Mark Miller]’s build is one of those just-for-the-fun-of-it things. He started with a bag full of NE-2 tubes and the realization that a 3D-printed frame would let him create his own seven-segment displays. The frames have a slot for each segment, with a lamp and current limiting …read more
Continue reading A Relay Calculator With DIY Neon Displays, Just Because
[Absolutelyautomation] has a problem with seven-segment displays. Fitting these displays in an enclosure is a pain because you can’t drill perfectly square holes, and you will invariably mess up a few enclosures with overzealous file work. There is a solution to this problem – panel mount meters.
The bezels on these panel mount meters hide the imperfections in the enclosure, and usually don’t require screws. They are, however, dedicated displays, usually for temperature, RPM, or some other measurement.
[Absolutelyautomation] took one of these dedicated panel mount displays and turned it into an all-purpose device. Basically, it’s a panel mount Arduino …read more
Continue reading Panel Mount Display Solves The Problem Of Drilling Square Holes