The Art of Making a Nixie Tube
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN commenters call it mesmerizing and a great look at how things are actually made by a dedicated craftsman.
What it is
Dalibor Farny documents the hand manufacture of a nixie tube, from glassblowing to evacuation, with text notes rather than narration. He revived the lost craft of nixie tube making.
Recommended by 6 HN commenters across 6 different months, 2017 to 2026.
What Hacker News said
Strong rec dustinmoorenet · 2018-06 · on “The Nixie Tube Story: The Neon Display Tech That Engineers Can’t Quit”
The video in the article is just amazing. You don't normally get to see the exact details of how things get made. [this video]
Strong rec brokenmachine · 2021-07 · on “List of Special Elevator Modes”
Going even more OT, I watched a mesmerizing and beautiful youtube video about making nixie tubes. I love craftsman videos. [this video]
Strong rec dymk · 2023-03 · on “One Man’s Quest to Revive the Great American Vacuum Tube”
I came to comment about Dalibor as well - amazing youtube channel. Recommended viewing for anyone who loves home-ish-scale, high-quality manufacturing: [this video] He's got to be one of the world's experts on nixie tube manufacturing, at this point.
Recommends zxcvgm · 2018-04 · on “Hand Made Vacuum Tubes by Claude Paillard (2012) [video]”
if you liked watching this, then maybe you'd also like these videos, which i watched some time ago: making a miniature vacuum tube triode [LINK] The Art of Making a Nixie Tube [this video]
Recommends janekm · 2020-04 · on “Casio CQ-1 calculator and clock”
Getting a custom VFD made would be a very expensive process indeed. If you need a very small number of segments then Dalibor Farny can make a custom Nixie tube, which is similar technology: [LINK] Also a good introduction to how they are made (making a VFD would be similar but more difficult): [this video] Otherwise Noritake itron still make VFD monitors for industrial applications (seems they have high temp advantages over LCDs): [LINK]
Recommends jkingsman · 2021-11 · on “IoT Nixie Tubes”
Tangentially, this is a beautiful (with no music or narration; text notes only) high quality video of modern artisanal (i.e. all by hand) nixie tube manufacturing. [this video]
Cites mmagin · 2017-03 · on “What the death of the CRT display technology means for classic arcade machines”
CRT production is a much more complex bit of modern manufacturing than making vinyl LPs. This youtube video documents what a rather dedicated individual does to resurrect small-scale Nixie tube manufacturing: [this video] And technologically, color CRTs are way beyond that. [LINK]
Cites CaliforniaKarl · 2018-11 · on “The Vacuum Tube’s Many Modern-Day Uses”
And of course, there's the Nixie tube. [this video] (Previously posted in [LINK] , the maker's web site via [LINK] , and covered in an IEEE article via [LINK] )