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a case for the fixietubes

A project log for Fixietube - Fake Nixie Tube displays

30ml jam jars turned into beautiful LED displays - nixietube like looking without the higher voltage fuzz

davedarkodavedarko 02/27/2015 at 18:500 Comments

The challenge here was to design a case that fits 4 displays and is also printable. Each fixietube socket is 5cm x 5cm - so putting them all next to each other would already mean a case of more than 20cm width, something that held me from designing it in the first place for a long time. But then I figured I could print in a 45 degree angle and the case of 24cm x 7cm was not a problem anymore! Well, at least in size.

The first shell I've printed over night came out almost perfect, but the second half cracked. I used a hot air and the screws to fix the posture of the shell and then extruded ABS into the crack to seal it. Reworking it with a file and acetone I got some pretty satisfying results. I may reprint this with z-ultra some day, since it is supposed to be not that expanding etc., but for now I'm quite happy that I have a case :)

ToDo: The arduino and the time module have to be placed somehow, and I have to come up with a way to set the time module once in a while, because of all of the gas lamps in Germany that need the summertime settings. The power connector is not connected yet.

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