Watch Your Life Tick Away With This Lifetime Countdown Clock

February 6, 2020 by Dan Maloney 26 Comments

Good news, everyone! Now you can have an ongoing existential crisis, every second of your ever-dwindling life with this personal life countdown timer.

Why would anyone want to be confronted by a count of the number of seconds left until you’ve made 80 trips around the sun? We can think of plenty of reasons not to, but creator [Jia Xun Chai] thought it would be somehow motivating to see the seconds tick irretrievably by while going about his life. Thus the idea for “Lifeclocc” came to be, with its ten seven-segment displays and Teensy to tally up and display the number of seconds left in a nominal 80-year life. A DS3231 RTC module keeps it on track between power-offs. It’s not clear what happens when you hit your 80th birthday; we assume it rolls over and starts counting up as you start playing in the bonus round. No word either on what happens should you croak with time left on the clock. Answer these questions and many more by building one yourself, or you can just wait for the Kickstarter.

It took [Jia Xun] three years to develop Lifeclocc, during which time his personal life clock decreased by 94,608,000 seconds. We will say that the finished product, with its matte-finish PCB, makes a handsome timepiece. Circuit sculptor [Mohit Bhoite] took a less-angsty stab at a similar clock, the cute appearance of which is no doubt intended to blunt the pain of impending doom.

A Network Attached VFD Tube Clock

February 6, 2020 by Tom Nardi 12 Comments

The elegance of Power over Ethernet (PoE) is that you can provide network connectivity and power over a single cable. Unfortunately not nearly enough hardware seems to support this capability, forcing intrepid hackers to take matters into their own hands. The latest in this line of single-cable creations is this beautiful Vacuum Fluorescent Display (VFD) clock from [Glen Akins].

One of the key advantages VFDs have over their Nixie predecessors is greatly reduced energy consumption, and after [Glen] ran the numbers, he saw that a display using six VFD tubes could easily be powered with standard PoE hardware. With this information, he started designing the PCB around the early 1990s era IV-12 tube, which has the advantage of being socketed so he could easily remove them later if necessary.

[Glen] first had to create a schematic and PCB footprint for the IV-12 tube that he could import into Eagle, which he was kind enough to share should anyone else be working with these particular tubes down the line. After a test of the newly designed socket was successful, he moved onto the rest of the electronics.

The clock is powered by a Microchip PIC18F67J60, which connects to the Ethernet network and pulls the current time down from NTP. After seeing so many clocks use an ESP to connect to the Internet over WiFi, there’s something refreshing about seeing a wired version. The tube segments are driven by a HV5812, also Microchip branded. Lastly, [Glen] used a number of DC/DC converters to generate the 1.5 V, 3.3 V, 5 V, and 25 V necessary to drive all the electronics and VFDs.

We absolutely love the simplicity of this clock, from its sleek aluminum enclosure to that single RJ45 jack on the back. But if you’re looking for something with a bit more flash, [Glen] also put together some PoE Christmas lights over the holidays which share a number of design elements with this project.

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Unique Clock Finally Unites Hackers And Sequins

January 30, 2020 by Tom Nardi 24 Comments

We’ve all seen the two-color sequin fabrics you can “draw” on by dragging your finger over so the pieces flip to the other color. It’s fun stuff to play with, and very popular with the kids right now, but if you asked us if the material had any practical application we’d have said no. But that was before we saw this clever clock created by [Ekaggrat Singh Kalsi] that he calls Sequino.

Since a clock (at least one that only shows hours and minutes) doesn’t need to refresh very quickly, [Ekaggrat] thought that the sequin material could work as a display. Of course the tricky part is figuring out how to actually draw on it reliably. It can’t be done from the back, and since the sequins are plastic, you can’t use a magnet. The only way to do it is with a robotic “finger” and some very slick kinematics.

The most obvious feature of the Sequino is the belt drive that goes the length of its cylindrical shape. When the two motors connected to the belt are turning in the same direction, the pointer is moved left or right. But when the motors turn in opposite directions, the tension on the belt forces the pointer to extend and contact the sequins. It’s like an H-bot , but with the shortest ever Y axis. The front bar is moved up and down with rotating rings inside of the device. It will probably make a lot more sense once you watch the video of it in operation after the break.

[Ekaggrat] says this project was developed as part of his quest to build “doodle clocks” that draw out the time continuously. The advantage of using the sequin fabric is that it shouldn’t be damaged by repetitive use, an issue he’s tried to solve via photonic means in the past.

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Clock Uses Custom LED Displays To Keep Myst Time

January 28, 2020 by Tom Nardi 17 Comments

The Myst fans in the audience will love this project because it displays the 25-hour timekeeping system of the D’ni. The hardware hackers will lean a little closer to their screen because it does so with custom made 25-segment LEDs, and the precision obsessed will start breathing heavily when they hear it maintains an accuracy of 0.001 seconds. As for which of those camps creator [Mike Ando] most identifies with, we can’t say. But we definitely respect his style.

We’ll spare you the in-depth description of the base-25 number system apparently used in the Myst franchise. If you’re interested enough you can click on through to the project’s Hackaday.io page and learn how to actually read the clock. Presumably you’ll then come back here and leave your comment in Klingon.

Let’s instead jump right to the part that really gets us excited, those custom displays. To create them, [Mike] cut the face out of black acrylic with a laser, and filled each void with a mixture of clear resin and very fine gypsum plaster. Getting the mix right can be a little finicky as the plaster can clump up, but the end result diffuses the light nicely. The acrylic front panel and a couple of cardboard “gaskets” to keep the light from leaking onto adjacent segments is then stacked on top of a PCB with corresponding 0603 SMD LEDs.

Beyond the soul-crushing number of wires required to hook everything up internally, the rest of the project is relatively straightforward. It uses a WeMos D1 Mini to connect to the WiFi network and pull the current time down from the geographically closest NTP server every couple of hours. Rather than putting a temperature controlled oscillator on the board, [Mike] has decided to pin his accuracy on a constantly on Internet connection and aggressive synchronizations.

From impressive curved bar graph modules to displays segmented with household items, we’ve seen our fair share of custom indicators. But we have to admit that building 25-segment LED displays for the alphabet of a fictional interstellar species sets the bar pretty high.

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HDD-Driven Chime Clock Is Quite Striking

January 21, 2020 by Kristina Panos 20 Comments

It seems that the more hectic life gets, the harder it is to consciously slow down and enjoy the experience. There’s always another bill to worry about, and a new deadline around the corner. The last thing we need are ultra-precise digital clocks everywhere we look. When it’s time to relax, there’s more than enough room for a passive type of clock that gives the time on time’s terms.

[Scoops]’ beautiful chime-only clock seems perfect for its location — an intimate event space inside an old house in Taiwan. Having only a vague sense of passing time helps us relax responsibly at social events. There’s no need to pull out your phone or glance at your watch when notifications about the passage of time softly permeate the air.

Here’s how it works: a NodeMCU controls four hard drive actuators through a ULN2003. The actuators each have a small extension and a clapper fitted on the end, which strikes the aluminium tubes that make up the chimes. There’s a web interface where [Scoops] can set the chimes to sound as frequently or infrequently as desired, or schedule a quiet period during the overnight hours. In emergencies, the clock can also be muted directly with the push of a button.

Take a little time to check out the short videos after the break, because this thing does a mean Westminster Chimes. But don’t stay too long, because time is running out! You have until Friday, January 24th to enter our Tell Time Contest over on IO.

Time can be relaxing or suffocating, depending on the way you look at it. If it’s visual relaxation you need, watch this bubble clock and float away from reality for a while.

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74-Series Clock Gets A MEMS Heart

January 16, 2020 by Lewin Day 15 Comments

[Erik van Zijst] has had a long career as a programmer, but lacked an understanding of what was happening at a bare metal level. After building a few logic gates out of transistors to get a feel for electronics, he set out to build a working clock using 74-series logic. Naturally, it was quite the adventure.

The project starts out as many do on the breadboard. The requisite BCD counters and 7-segment displays were sourced, and everything was connected up with a cavalcade of colorful hookup wires. A 32.768 KHz crystal was pressed into service to generate the clock signal, divided down to get a 1Hz output to drive the seconds counter that would then run the entire clock. [Erik] then had to learn some more practical electronics skills, to deal with debouncing buttons for the time setting circuit.

With the clock now functional, [Erik] decided to take things further, aiming to build something more robust and usable. An automatic brightness control was created using a 555 to run a crude PWM dimmer for the LEDs. Additionally, a PCB was designed to replace the temporary breadboard setup. This led to problems with the oscillator that [Erik] couldn’t quite figure out. Rather than continue on the same path, he changed tack, instead replacing the quartz crystal with a modern MEMS oscillator that solved the problem.

It’s a great look at how to construct a working clock from bare logic, and one that serves to remind us just how complex even a seemingly simple device can be. We’ve seen other from-scratch builds before too, like this 777-transistor clock, or this attractive stacked design. Video after the break.

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Arduino Wristwatch Has LED Hands

January 5, 2020 by Al Williams 20 Comments

When you read “Arduino wristwatch”, you fall into the trap of envisioning an Arduino UNO clumsily strapped to someone’s wrist. [Marijo Blažević’s] creation is much more polished than that. A round circuit board holds two surface mount ICs and 12 LEDs. The whole thing looks nice fit snugly inside of a watch body. It isn’t a Rolex, but it does have considerable geek cred without being unwearable in polite company.

One IC is an AVR micro, of course. The other is a DS3231 real time clock with built-in crystal. A CR2032 keeps it all running. The main body, the outer ring, the bottom, and the buttons are 3D printed in PLA. The crystal and the band are the only mechanical parts not printed. The bill of materials shows a 36mm crystal and even provides links for all the parts.

You don’t want to run LEDs all the time because it is bad on the battery. When you press the button once, you get one of the LEDs to light to show the hours. Another press reads the minutes in units of 5 minutes. A third press shows you one of five LEDs to show how many minutes to add. For example, if the time is 9:26 you’d get LED 9 (hours), LED 5 for 25 minutes, and the third press would show LED 1 for 1 extra minute. If either of the minute indicators show 12 o’clock, that indicates zero minutes.

The exciting thing, of course, is that you can program it beyond the code on GitHub. Already it can tell time and display the temperature. You don’t have a lot of I/O, but you ought to be able to get some more options and maybe some flashy LED blinking patterns in if you try.