I've decided to embark on a new build using the club circuits, and really try and create a "polished" machine that I can put in the living room and show off. And in the last 10 years there's a new technology I've spent a lot of time with - 3D printing! So hopefully we'll get to design and print a few parts for the new televisor. Stuff like an adjustable opto-fork mount, and perhaps a mount for the light, too. 3D design and printing is FUN, and I'll be using OpenSCAD for the design of any printed parts.
Here are my basic goals;
1) Use and document inexpensive equipment, so that anyone interested in doing this who doesn't have tools and skills can copy this diary and learn a bit.
2) Completely document parts required, cost, and source of these.
3) Design and print some parts in 3D, and share the process
If you don't know where to get stuff, there is of course eBay - but I source a LOT of my goodies from AliExpress - which generally offers free shipping for many things, and is amazingly cheap. The downside of AliExpress can be low quality, and long delivery times - 30+ days.
Let's start with tools.
1) A soldering iron. I'm going with a super-cheap one with a fine tip. It's a 40W job you can find in any electronics store, basically. The tip is quite fine; think like the tip of a pencil. Mine is over 10 years old and cost me about $10. I know you can get fantastic soldering gear, but I'm on a budget for this build. Have a look at AliExpress 40W Soldering Irons. This list should be sorted by price, with free shipping. Looks like the cheapest is just US$2.38
2) A magnifying glass and soldering iron holder. You're going to really benefit from having a magnifying class for doing fine soldering work. Something like this... Jaycar's soldering stand - I bought one today - it's great! Here's an AliExpress option... Soldering Iron Holder with Magnifying Glass
3) A multimeter. It doesn't have to be fancy, but one with auto-ranging makes life easier. Check out AliExpress's Auto ranging multimeters, Looks like you can get one for about US$3.22 give or take. Free shipping.
4) An oscilloscope. Don't panic! We can get a useable oscilloscope for under US$20 (shipped!). The DSO138 is capable enough for our purposes. On AliExpress they're common... DSO138 Oscilloscope - soldered! - Pretty cool little machine for under $20! Beware, though, most of these are pirated/fake clones. That doesn't mean they don't WORK, it just means that the original maker doesn't get anything for their work, and quality might be an issue. If you want to get the genuine thing, it's still under $25 give or take. Visit the original company's forum and search for the list of recommended suppliers. You can buy them as a DIY kit or for a couple dollars more a soldered functional unit. It took me about 2-3 hours to build the kit version, which was fun but I wouldn't choose to do it again.
That's about all the tools you'll need. Will need various bits and bobs - wire snips, wire, solder, scissors, etc., but I'll leave those for you to sort out. I did personally absolutely hate the lead-free solder - I go with 60/40 lead/tin solder myself. But if you're safety conscious about this sort of stuff, then you might have to upgrade your soldering iron because basically non-lead solder sucks big time and you need a hotter iron. /rant
I'm going to be building this televisor using the circuit boards available from the NBTV Club Shop. In particular you are going to need the Video Pre-amplifier and Sync Separator PCB board and the Video amplifier and LED/neon driver board. I ordered mine from club member Vic Brown who was incredibly helpful and wrote the following in response to my request for parts and info...
There are two sets of PCBs for televisor projects.
The earlier 'Klaas Robers' boards consist of a Clamp + LED driver PCB and a Pre-amp + Sync separator PCB. These are intended for a mechanical televisor, but could be employed in an electronic monitor. A motor control board for a mechanical televisor is not included in this set of PCBs. The holes to mount the components need to be drilled out by the constructor.
The later set of 'Peter Smith' PCBs consists of Sync separator + LED driver PCB and a Motor drive PCB. Together the provide all the electronics for a mechanical televisor. They are possibly less suitable for extracting signals for an electronic televisor. The PCBs are tinned and pre-drilled.
The club can provide the ICs, FETs, diodes and opto fork components for these projects, but capacitors, resistors, etc must be sourced locally.
Construction details for both these projects is given in the NBTV Handbook and, for the Peter Smith PCBs, is reproduced on the club web site.
So, I put an order through for the Peter Smith board and all components the club could supply which set me back UK PDS 23.47 including postage. The component list...
- 1 x LED PCB
- 1 x Motor PCB
- 1 x CA3140
- 1 x CA3240
- 2 x IRF630
- 1 x MC4046
- 1 x 1N4001
- 1 x 1N5817
- 1 x LD271 (infrared emitter)
- 1 x TIL100 (photodiode)
So that's the start of the parts list. I'll keep that up-to-date as we go through construction.
One other thing you will need is a way of playing NBTV-format "video" files - these are actually one channel (left ear or right ear) of the output from a CD player with line-out. So you want to find one of those little portable CD-players they had in the '90s which were super cool and now are junk. Ask around on your local FreeCycle site - this is a fantastic place to find free stuff that people don't want anymore. See the FreeCycle Network homepage to find if your area is covered. Highly recommended.
If you can't find a CD player there may very well be more modern portable equipment - MP3 players perhaps - that can play appropriate format files. Essentially we want to be playing files that are NOT compressed, as that distorts the video signal. More about that later - for now, look for something that can play uncompressed PCM stereo audio at 44100 Hz sample rate, 16-bit sample format. Essentially, WAV files. By the way, one "channel" is video, as I said. The other is our mono audio channel
More stuff we need (and will update the parts list above when source found)...
- resistors and capacitors and other components for boards not supplied by the club. To be established.
- a Nipkow disk, a motor to turn it, something to mount it on. I bought mine long ago, so I'm going to have to look for other options for you, dear reader. Please feel free to suggest something. Or, watch this space.
- a power supply to run the whole thing. We're going to use a fair bit of power to run the bright display and motor, so something that can pump out 15V at about 5A or so. More on this later.
- super-bright LEDs for our display light-source. More on these later!
- stuff I have forgotten to mention
So now, for me at least, it's a game of waiting for the parts to arrive. I'll try and make another entry when that happens, and we can start construction. I'll also be modifying this post when I think of things that I have forgotten. The parts list should always be up-to-date so come back to this post for a correct list of stuff as it stands during the build.
Finally, we're going to have to build some sort of mount for the disk to spin on, and to "be"our TV. For the while, though, it's going to be a quick-and-dirty mount which I'll show pictures of soon (basically re-using my old televisor's box until the new one is working, and then making something pretty to transplant it into).
So, that's the grand plan. This is going to take quite a few months - plenty of time for you to order your parts and tools! The best time to plant a tree is 10 years ago. The second best time is right now. So, get busy.
