Count-up timer with TIL305 - built

Thanks to a pre-wired breadboard the circuit went together in an hour:

From left to right: most significant digits and ATtiny4313, least significant digits and ATtiny4313, CD4060 oscillator and divider. Decoupling capacitors on the Vcc supply rail (that must be used in digital logic circuits!) prevent detection of false 1 Hz input pulses.


The circuit in the picture is powered with a 18650 LiPo cell at about 3.8V and it has been running all night to test the firmware past 10 hours of operation.

At powerup is starts counting immediately. First only seconds are shown. Then minutes and seconds until 59' 59". Then it switches to what is shown in the picture. After 9h 59' you get HH MM.

The font was chosen as a trade off of readability vs cozyness vs current consumption. There is some MSD blanking too, but it doesn't last long.

Further improvements before looking for a suitable box: add the battery, a 1S LiPo (dis)charge controller, a power switch. Maybe some firmware improvement once the timer is shown to the public.

Besides as kitchen timer, it can be used as elapsed work(-day) timer ... that's where I will hopefully gather some extra feedback.

The firmware is written in BASCOM. I want to do some further optimisation before uploading the code to my github account. Binary is available on request as well as TIL305, if need too.

Count-up timer with TIL305 - design

After building few clocks and thinking of many more, I wanted to do something slightly different. The "new" idea came one evening while cooking, when I realised I never remember at what time the pasta (food) will be ready. "Was it 20:14 or 20:20?"

I am too lazybusy to set a countdown timer every time and since my short-term memory is not willing to cooperate I chose to try a count-up timer: a simple device that shows elapsed time.

For this task I wanted to use TIL305 5x7 dot-matrix LED displays made in 1970's. Two challenges:

1. they need an appropriate driver
2. they are very current hungry

I had already solved the driver problem by reproducing someone else's idea to adapt an ATtiny2313 microcontroller. You need one ATtiny every TIL305. Cost-wise in 2018 this solution is probably cheaper than using obsolete unobtanium driver chips.

Texas TIL305, Monsanto MAN2A, ...

Since I want my timer to be battery powered, at about 38 mA per 2313&305 pair, I cannot use too many displays. Four digits is the minimum useful IMO ("mm:ss" and "hh:mm" for longer runs), but another idea comes to the rescue: use smaller font, 5x3 dots vs 5x7 and show two digits on each TIL305. This approach has another advantage: limit the required wiring (I won't be doing a PCB!).

How about the timebase? ATtiny's will not synchronise, they will receive both the same external timebase signal and rely on their internal clock to run the code. I could have had one master driver generating the pulse for others, but I am not sure on the internal RC calibration and on longer runs the difference vs 1 pps could be unacceptable. So there will be a 32.768 kHz oscillator and divider with CD4060 chip (because it accepts a wide range of supply voltage).

Old vs modern high voltage capacitors

Side by side comparison of the size of 500+ V capacitors, same values. 1955 vs 2018!

Well, the dielectric is different!

First MW reception on the RD-160

So, with the lamp limiter just built I could dare to power the Radiomarelli RD-160 medium wave receiver.

I scrounged home for filament light bulbs and I located 40W, 60W and 100W.

I stared with 40W, that lit up and nothing came out of the receiver. Maybe I wasn't patient enough, or its rating is just too low.

One step further to 60W and ... after the first bright flash, the lamp dim dim dim .... until some noise comes out of the receiver! The residual light is very warm and pleasant too! It works!! It receives RAI1 broadcast on 999 kHz and nothing else.

Problems noted:

1. When the tuning capacitor blades go towards full mesh the local oscillator stops: there's a short.
2. The volume control crackles
3. Knobs don't hold tight on the shaft because their plastic is cracked near the screw

Not bad at all! It is electronically fine! Now I will replace capacitors.

My poor man's AC limiter

Reading around the Net, everyone mentions that powering old valve circuits under restoration should be done gradually by applying a lower voltage and observing what happens. That's until all capacitors are confirmed to be working (or replaced) and transformers are not shorted. This is accomplished with a tapped or variable autotransformer, that I don't have.

One solution would be to wire back-to-back two step-down transformers, like 220-12 and 220-24 that should provide 110V if connected 220-12-24-220. Of course, I don't have such a selection of old-school transformers.

The "poor man's AC voltage transformer" trick comes to the rescue: connect a filament light bulb in series with the D.U.T. and observe what goes on. It will not allow to control the actual voltage, nor to change it on the fly, but it will limit the current through D.U.T. thus reduce the risk of smoke/fire/damage. Lower wattage bulbs provide lower voltage to the D.U.T. and let less current pass through, therefore less damage is done in case of troubles.

As I understand it, the principle is that a fault in the D.U.T causing excess current draw will be tamed by the light bulb which in turn will light up and provide visual feedback of a problem. Begin with lower wattage and replace with higher, step by step, as the home stock of old filament light bulb allows.

In order to build a "safe" transformer device I decided to modify a power strip: it has a power cord, outlets and an embedded switch. The mod is to wire in series two outlets, the first being used to plug the light bulb (installed in an existing lamp, for example), the second for the D.U.T. A third socket, left in parallel with the second, can be used to measure AC voltage across D.U.T.

The light bulb limiter, finished.

Things to do and remember:

• AC mains is lethal;
• add visual signs to the power strip that it is NOT a power strip anymore;
• mark sockets with their intended use;
• filament light bulbs get hot, so do not hurry to change it for the next!

If all goes well, the first troubleshooting session will not trip my home's AC protection.