On the front of a building in New York City, above a branch of the ubiquitous Starbucks coffee chain, there is a clock. It is no ordinary clock, the 200 Water Street clock is an art installation created by the artist [Rudolph de Harak], and consists of 72 lighted numbers which are illuminated in sequence to show hours, minutes, and seconds. It is a landmark of sufficient fame that [Jason Ben Nathan] and [Eldar Slobodyan], Cornell University students of [Bruce Land], decided to make their own tribute to it as their course project.
The front panel is a piece of ply with the required numbers nicely laser-cut. All the schematics and code are available, should you fancy your hand at building your own version of the clock.
If you are curious about the real-life clock here’s an image. But you get a much more interesting perspective if you stand in front of it. If you just can’t go there, get an approximation through the wonders of Google Street View.
The lack of holes in the 0, 4, 6, 8 and 9 digits looks really, really ugly…
Yep. A stencil font would have given it the stencil font look though, and that also wouldn’t suit it. No easy solution immediately comes to my mind.
Put down temporary tape over the entire part being laser cut to retain the pieces, then laser cut with your font of choice and then use the cut parts as a template to glue the “loose” number parts down onto a transparency or clear film?
Not sure that qualifies as very quick or easy though but it would at least preserve the font selection or missing pieces if desired at low cost and hassle.
Maybe black spray paint on clear acrylic, then laser off the black spray paint. It would also leave a nice frosted surface for the light to illuminate.
Where do you get an off-the-shelf WWVB receiver?
So far as I can find, DigiKey doesn’t have one.
They said where the got the receiver in the original article. They didn’t give a link for some reason, but a quick search turned it up: https://universal-solder.com/product/60khz-wwvb-atomic-radio-clock-receiver-replaces-c-max-cmmr-6p-60/
Ugh. $15.50? You can get a GPS module cheaper than that and pick the time out. https://www.ebay.com/itm/GYNEO6MV2-GPS-Module-NEO-6M-GY-NEO6MV2-Board-with-Antenna-for-Arduino/311772823171?_trkparms=aid%3D555019%26algo%3DPL.BANDIT%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D41375%26meid%3D7952881341e14ac48606fb5bf8807531%26pid%3D100505%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D1%26&_trksid=p2045573.c100505.m3226
Or use a 3$ esp and get the time from internet via wifi
Here I thought it was a LOTTO board…
Esp and GPS module come cheaper I bought it last month.
https://www.hackster.io/bigjosh/three-story-tall-clock-final-entry-5ab263?ref=challenge&ref_id=25&offset=19 is how the original was refurbished