While I have the pleasure of reviewing a multitude of interesting devices writing for Tindie, few products jump out quite as much as this one in the sense of it being something that hackers have needed for years, but never thought to ask for—a Nixie tube driver board! Yes, that’s right, now instead of coming up with your own custom circuitry or buying a kit or even a fully assembled model, you can use these exixe boards to control a Nixie tube with 3 wires via SPI.
Since they’re individual modules, you could arrange them however you want for a unique display powered by an Arduino, ESP8266, or many other devices. The boards come in two different versions shown below. The board on the left accommodates an IN-14 tube, and the board on the right is used with an IN-12.
Of course there is one small catch in that Nixie tubes need 170VDC to operate properly. These boards don’t supply that, so you’ll need to turn to a Nixie power supply module that can be had for less than $10 plus shipping. As powering each one individually would add expense and bulk, this seems like a good tradeoff.
While this could unleash a flood of creativity in the Nixie display department, if you’d like more of a head start with your creation you could turn instead to the MSP430 Nixie tube clock kit. It includes everything you’ll need to build your own clock besides a power supply. As seen in this writeup, I built one of my own, which was a lot of fun and it looks great!
