{"id":1721,"date":"2024-02-03T16:35:22","date_gmt":"2024-02-03T16:35:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.adrian-smith31.co.uk\/blog\/?p=1721"},"modified":"2024-02-03T16:37:29","modified_gmt":"2024-02-03T16:37:29","slug":"connecting-vintage-incandescent-filament-displays-to-a-microcontroller","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.adrian-smith31.co.uk\/blog\/2024\/02\/connecting-vintage-incandescent-filament-displays-to-a-microcontroller\/","title":{"rendered":"Connecting vintage incandescent (filament) displays to a microcontroller"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’d thought I’d share these cool retro 7 segment displays I obtained from an old aircraft radio. They are Wamco KW-104S direct view incandescent filament displays which are compatible with LED display driver code – just treat them like common anode 7 segment LED displays. Easy! You just have to bear in mind that they need an operating voltage of 4 volts and they draw around 15mA per segment. Due to their self current limiting nature, they do not need current limiting resistors between the driver chip and the display. Note I said driver chip as with the current drawn from these displays you are best using a power shift register such as the TPIC6B595 or a transistor array rather than driving them from the microcontroller or shift register pins directly.<\/p>\n

A datasheet can be found here https:\/\/www.wamcoinc.com\/assets\/pdf\/Display%20Catalog.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n

Some images and a video<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n