The Art of Making a Nixie Tube [video]

[jazzychad]

This is really cool. I've been enamored with Nixie tubes since I was a kid, and I finally got my hands on some surplus CCCP tubes and started a project with them. I'm keeping somewhat of a diary of my progress with photos and videos in this collection of tweets about the process: https://twitter.com/jazzychad/timelines/773442085278085121

[digi_owl]

Heh, reminds me of when i first found out that the spare tubed a musician friend of mine kept around for his amp was CCCP stamped. Given that we are both old enough that we grew up during the tail end of the cold war, that seemed somewhat like consorting with the enemy at first glance. These days i wonder how much of the cold war, particularly after Stalin's death, was a massive US propaganda creation.

[setori88]

That induction heating step is critical. Ensure you heat metal whilst the vacuum system is still pumping otherwise if you heat the metal after the tube is sealed the metal will out gas giving you bad vacuum, completely destroying your Nixie tube. It's a pleasure to see such refined work, many many frustrating mistakes were made to reach this level of refinement.

[rzzzt]

Isn't that why the getter is added?

[grandalf]

It's incredible to see all the different sorts of craftsmanship needed to make tubes. It would be fascinating to turn this video into a longer exploration of the evolution of each of the techniques used.

[Animats]

Artisanal vacuum tubes are a thing.[1] There's some interest in this from the vinyl record and overpriced tube amp crowd. There are even people who rebuild old CRTs for early TVs.[2] It's a lot of work.

[1] http://hackaday.com/2014/11/21/artisanal-vacuum-tubes-hackad... [2] http://www.earlytelevision.org/crt_rebuild.html

[mozumder]

Almost as cool as artisinal lightbulbs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmLp9Mn-5rg

[GirlsCanCode]

There's no vacuum in a Nixie Tube!

That being said, it would be nice if classic tubes of yesteryear can be remade efficiently. Especially for antique radio enthusiasts.

[analognoise]

I wish there was a parts list for this! One of the problems that took so much effort in tube lifetimes were the coatings used. I'm wondering what types of coatings he's using. Need more info!

[cyberferret]

I'd be interested to learn more too. Old methods of tube production produced a lot of waste like Mercury and other toxic (carcinogenic) byproducts. I believe modern production methods (where they still exist) are better, and I bet this subject would make an interesting video/read in its own right.

[jbuzbee]

I'm really, really impressed with the amount of work that goes into making these tubes and can understand why he's selling them for around $150, but what I don't get is how he can compete with the nixie tubes that go for under $10 on eBay. Are his better or more reliable?

[fake-name]

Primarily size. The $10 ebay nixies are tiny.

If you can find 2-3" digit size nixie tubes on ebay for a substantially better rate then these, I'd be very, very surprised.

[jwr]

His are way, way nicer than most of what you can get on eBay these days. And if you find the big IN-18 or Z568M tubes, they will have comparable prices.

I also noticed that Dalibor provides warranty — for initial batches, even lifetime warranty. That is very impressive and well worth the prices.

[lumberjack]

I've seen this elsewhere and what baffled me was the startup aspect of it all.

He spent 5 years doing this and a non-insignificant amount of money. How does he know it will eventually all be worth it?

It seems like such a baffling risky step to take.

[comboy]

I can't imagine him getting back money that was spent on the equipment visible on the video selling these tubes. It seems to me more like the money wasn't a problem, and he just really wanted to start making these tubes (which is awesome).

[djaychela]

He's got another business running, a classifieds website, which he says paid for him to experiment with nixies.

As for how he knows it will eventually be worth it, isn't that the case with most new businesses?

[teh_klev]

Previous discussion from around a month ago about Dalibor Farny building out his workshop etc:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12308974

http://www.daliborfarny.com/#about-me (you might need to scroll down to the "About Me" section).

[pavel_lishin]

> I needed more room so I moved from the garden shed to a local castle.

I had to rewind to make sure I heard that right.

[cornholio]

Number 6 is dead on the top left tube in the observation rack.

[hatsunearu]

Heh, that's a nice touch on the video if that was intentional.

[ams6110]

Glassblowing is a disappearing trade itself. I'm not sure what university chemistry departments are doing these days, an in-house glass shop with one if not several skilled glassblowers used to be pretty common. Likely it's cheaper now to have this outsourced.

[bch]

Here's a story from Caltech:

http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-caltech-glassbl...

[rwmj]

Imperial College's chemistry lab has their own glassblower:

https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24787-dream-job-scien...

[lokedhs]

Interesting to see those IKEA cutlery drying containers being used (about 3 minutes into the video). I've often seen them used for all sorts of different purposes. A very useful product.

http://www.ikea.com/sg/en/catalog/products/70179546/

[unwind]

Yeah, they're awesome and everywhere.

The name ORDNING means "order" (as in "the opposite of chaos", not as in "telling someone what to do"), by the way.

[db48x]

That seems like a pretty expensive manufacturing process. Not very capital-intensive though.

[markbnj]

That was a really amazing video. Thanks for sharing.

[gravypod]

Glass is an amazing material because it's one of the few that I can say I know nothing about how to manipulate it.