Well, I know I said I gave up on the point to point wiring version, but it kept on dragging me in...
Anyway, few hiccups...
The am/pm didn't work as planned, the final 4017 CO never actually goes low, so i wired the 4013 into the reset line instead.
It works.

also, I had the polarity switched on the 4011, that took a couple evenings to un-mess up

the left nixie power supply died, multiple times. the first couple I fixed by replacing the FET, the last one was a problem somewhere else holding the FET on, and I didn't find it within 10 minuets, so I wired it into the other one, and all is well

now all I need to do is move the power jack, wire in a wall-wart, and add a 9 volt clip
(and a case, my dad has decided to put himself in charge of that portion. He wants to steampunk it, and I'm more than willing to let him knock himself out)

I also credit the artists rattatat and the strokes for helping. for some reason I can actually think when I listen to them
And some piano music- helen jane long


finally, pics and vids

pics attached, youtube is uploading, I'll link when it's done

edit- if you want to see the underside, and all its spaghettified glory, i can provide pics

edit 2- video!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BPdEz3aDGY

 

Good job.

How's the PCB coming along?

 

Good job.

How's the PCB coming along?

need to make the am/pm change i mentioned, other than that i should be able order
wookie was kind enough to do some major editing to the SMPS to make it non-sucky

 

Yes, I saw that.

Are the final layout in that thread?

 

for the smps, yes
for the others, no

I'll make a thread with all of them before too long

(video's up)

 

(video's up)

Nice.....!

 

Good job Magnet.

How many hours spent in wiring?

Could you show the underside?

 

Great work, magnet18 !
Thanks for the pics and vid.

 

What function do the wires going up from the board and twisted together serve? Starting it, or not got around to a permanent solution for something?


Overall, Nice Work! No matter what the bottom looks like. (maybe)

 

Can't wait to see it in the Completed Projects Collection.

 

Good job Magnet.

How many hours spent in wiring?

Could you show the underside?

thanks, probably over a hundred hours in wiring, easy (if I never messed it up, it wouldn't have taken "that" long... but this is real life...)
if you include all the previous versions i tried, a lot more than that

I'll upload some pics when i get home

What function do the wires going up from the board and twisted together serve? Starting it, or not got around to a permanent solution for something?


Overall, Nice Work! No matter what the bottom looks like. (maybe)

those wires link the two boards together
when I mount it in a case I'll trim them real short and solder (and probably heat-shrink-wrap) them

and more wires make it more impressive, right

 

right-O
pics of the underside...
all told it's not THAT bad...

 

You would have fun with a wire wrap gun.

I have one that I picked up in the early 80's. You can make wire wrap connections with it very quickly. It's a Gardner-Denver 120vac corded model, just like the one shown on this page:
http://www.djerickson.com/bbus/proto.html
You can still get wire wrap sockets and the like, but most of this has gone the way of the dinosaur, as it's so much less expensive to get a prototype board made nowadays than pay a tech to wire up a board like this, it's just not worth it.

However, if it's your own project, and you have nothing but time on your hands...

As far as the high voltage SMPS supply - you didn't give me any feedback if items were in a specific location for a reason, or if they could be moved around. That board could be made quite a bit smaller if you had flexibility in where things could be located; like I/O connectors, lights, etc.

 

You would have fun with a wire wrap gun.

I have one that I picked up in the early 80's. You can make wire wrap connections with it very quickly. It's a Gardner-Denver 120vac corded model, just like the one shown on this page:
http://www.djerickson.com/bbus/proto.html
You can still get wire wrap sockets and the like, but most of this has gone the way of the dinosaur, as it's so much less expensive to get a prototype board made nowadays than pay a tech to wire up a board like this, it's just not worth it.

However, if it's your own project, and you have nothing but time on your hands...

I've heard of that, never looked into it...
apparently they used to make homemade computers that way when they were just starting out... so. much. wire

(thanks, now I'm gonna want one )

As far as the high voltage SMPS supply - you didn't give me any feedback if items were in a specific location for a reason, or if they could be moved around. That board could be made quite a bit smaller if you had flexibility in where things could be located; like I/O connectors, lights, etc.

Oh yea!
I was gonna, but I completely spaced it!

I'll post over there

 

You can still get wire wrap sockets and the like, but most of this has gone the way of the dinosaur, as it's so much less expensive to get a prototype board made nowadays than pay a tech to wire up a board like this, it's just not worth it.

Not entirely, thankfully. I love wire wrap. I don't know how long it has been around, but there's a "no strip" wrapper that holds the spool in the handle. It has a blade right where the wire comes out of the tip, and puts a slice in it lengthwise, right on the spot that is about to be in contact with the pin being wrapped.

Way cool. Wrap, route, Wrap, snip, repeat.

 

I've heard of that, never looked into it...
apparently they used to make homemade computers that way when they were just starting out... so. much. wire

Not just home-made computers.

It might interest you to know that the backplane for the YF-22 prototype common integrated processor was done using wire wrap; some of it by yours truly.

 

It might interest you to know that the backplane for the YF-22 prototype common integrated processor was done using wire wrap; some of it by yours truly.

From a mechanical point of view, how stable those things were? Acceleration and vibration wise?

 

the backplane for the YF-22 prototype common integrated processor was done using wire wrap; some of it by yours truly.

sorry, the what??

 

I've heard of that, never looked into it...
apparently they used to make homemade computers that way when they were just starting out... so. much. wire.

Not just homemade computers. An entire family of commercial, educational, and industrial computers from the originators of minicomputers, DEC - Digital Equipment Corporation, were manufactured with wire-wrap, PDP-8/S, PDP-9, PDP-15 minicomputers. We used to have all three. I still have a number of boards and core memory from the PDP-8/S.
I now regret letting that PDP-8/S go to a museum somewhere in the world.

 

sorry, the what??

Prototype F-22 20 years ago. It was a competition between Lockheed YF-22 and Northrup YF-23, the YF-22 won, which gave us today's F-22