Display not quite working right

[entozoon]

Hi there, first of all what you've made here is fantastic! I can't tell you how helpful it's been so far - all the diagrams in particular!

I've recreated your wiring with an MC6205 (although I believe it's exactly the same as MS6205) and it's aaaalmost working. I was hoping you might have a clue as to what's going wrong. Could be anything, and I'm a little out of ideas :(

Code snippet:

display.setCursor(0, 0);
display.write("A");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(1, 1);
display.write("B");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(2, 2);
display.write("C");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(3, 3);
display.write("D");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(4, 4);
display.write("E");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(5, 5);
display.write("F");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(6, 6);
display.write("G");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(7, 7);
display.write("H");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(8, 8);
display.write("I");
delay(1000);
display.setCursor(9, 9);
display.write("J");
delay(1000);

Expected display output

A
 B
  C
   D
    E
     F
      G
       H
        I
         J

Actual output (same every time):

Any clue dude? Perhaps I've done something wrong with the shift register..?

PS: Did you use some software to draw the text diagrams, or just by hand? Either way, fantastic work thanks again.

[entozoon]

Ah! I think I fixed it! With a combination of a few things, not sure exactly which:

• Faulty shift register chip
• Slight misconnections in breadboard
• USB power through ESP8266 not being quite enough, compared to external 5V supply for everything (including shift reg)

Sorry to bother you. Sometimes in asking a question it helps us figure out the answer ourselves :)

[holzachr]

Hey buddy,

I'm glad you fixed it! And of coure I'm happy to see that someone is eventually using my library...

The diagrams were painted using asciiflow.com - really great stuff they are doing there.

Whenever you're done with your project and feel like you'd like to upload some fancy pictures, please feel free :-)

[entozoon]

@holzachr I finished my project! https://www.michaelcook.tech/plasma-display-mc6205/

Loved making it, and wouldn't have managed it at all without the help of this lib so thank you very much! The only thing I couldn't figure out unfortunately was how to remove all the horizontal lines. I believe it is possible, based on a few photographs I found randomly where it appears they cut some resistors out: http://sim.loa.su/pub/_hardware/MC6205/MC6205.jpg http://sim.loa.su/pub/_hardware/MC6205/MC6205-cut-___.jpg The internals of my model isn't similar enough for me to just start snipping and find out :(

[holzachr]

Hey Michael, happy to see it worked out for you, and finally looks that nice. Is that wooden case laser cut? Also thank you for the hint about getting rid of those lines by cutting the resistors. Maybe I'll give that one a try one day...

Unfortunately my MC6250 (used for weather forecast) gave up after about half a year of service, showing increasing random distortion over time, even without any controller attached. One could probably dig down to a certain faulty IC, find a functional western substitution for it, fiddle some connection adapter negating some control lines... But not me ;-) Hope you may enjoy yours much longer!

[entozoon]

@holzachr It is indeed laser cut. Such a shame your screen deteriorated. I suppose they do eventually, but that sucks.

Perhaps consider grabbing another 'new old stock' one, while they're around. I bought this - https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1-x-Elektronika-MS6205-NEW-NOS-Nixie-matrix-screen-MC6205-factory-box/313399446006?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649