The 555 Has Been Around at Least 30 Years

[Watson A.Name - Watt Sun, Dark Remover]

I was thumbing thru some old data sheets from Intersil, and I noticed
that in the corner of the 555 data sheet, it daid Feb. 1973. Just out
of curiosity, how long ago did you do your first 555 project? I made
a darkroom timer with one back in '74, I believe. That was the least
used of all my projects. I never saved up enough money to buy any
darkroom equipment!



--
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Don't be ripped off by the big book dealers. Go to the URL
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http://www.everybookstore.com You'll be glad you did!
Just when you thought you had all this figured out, the gov't
changed it: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
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[Alien Zord]

I was thumbing thru some old data sheets from Intersil, and I noticed
that in the corner of the 555 data sheet, it daid Feb. 1973. Just out
of curiosity, how long ago did you do your first 555 project? I made
a darkroom timer with one back in '74, I believe. That was the least
used of all my projects. I never saved up enough money to buy any
darkroom equipment!

The 555 was designed by Signetics sometime around 1971 and I had the
original data book until 1998 when during a move to new premises I threw
away most of the old stuff. I still got some of the ICs marked NE555N in my
"linear" draw.

 

[Mjolinor]

I was thumbing thru some old data sheets from Intersil, and I noticed
that in the corner of the 555 data sheet, it daid Feb. 1973. Just out
of curiosity, how long ago did you do your first 555 project? I made
a darkroom timer with one back in '74, I believe. That was the least
used of all my projects. I never saved up enough money to buy any
darkroom equipment!

It's like hacking TV, fun to do, good results but never time to watch it.
Not that there is anything to watch anyway.

You can allways use it to time your boiled eggs.

 

[Michael]

I was thumbing thru some old data sheets from Intersil, and I noticed
that in the corner of the 555 data sheet, it daid Feb. 1973. Just out
of curiosity, how long ago did you do your first 555 project? I made
a darkroom timer with one back in '74, I believe. That was the least
used of all my projects. I never saved up enough money to buy any
darkroom equipment!

I used 555's in a project at work many, many moons ago. Had to be in
'72 or '73. The 555's were wired monostable, controlled some voltages
and signals to a PROM (Poccles(sp?) Readout Optical Memory) cell.
Interesting device. A PROM cell is to an optical image what a latch is
to a binary bit. Ultimately my device was hung on the busines end of
the reflector telescope at Kit Peak Observatory to record images of
........???? I never knew.

 

[Ian Buckner]

message The 555 was designed by Signetics sometime around 1971 and I had the
original data book until 1998 when during a move to new premises I threw
away most of the old stuff. I still got some of the ICs marked NE555N in my
"linear" draw.

ISTR that the real original '555 was the winning submission in
a US circuit design competition as to what you could do with
a "linear array" semi-custom chip (Exar?).

Regards
Ian

 

[Spehro Pefhany]

ISTR that the real original '555 was the winning submission in
a US circuit design competition as to what you could do with
a "linear array" semi-custom chip (Exar?).

http://www.eet.com/special/special_issues/millennium/milestones/camenzind.html

Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

 

[Anthony Fremont]

http://www.eet.com/special/special_issues/millennium/milestones/camenzind.html

Neat link, that jogged a few brain cells back into action. IIRC, there
was some confusion when other manufacturers started copying the chip.
Something about the formulae for calculating the timing being different
depending upon whose datasheet you examined. Odd, considering that they
were exact copies.

 

[Robert Monsen]

I was thumbing thru some old data sheets from Intersil, and I noticed
that in the corner of the 555 data sheet, it daid Feb. 1973. Just out
of curiosity, how long ago did you do your first 555 project? I made
a darkroom timer with one back in '74, I believe. That was the least
used of all my projects. I never saved up enough money to buy any
darkroom equipment!

School project 1983, UC Berkeley, I designed and built a 'drunk disabler'
using a 556. It was a series of 10 buttons, with LEDs over them. It had used
a 556 and a couple of counters, if I remember correctly. The system would
flash the LEDs in pseudo random order, and you had to push each of the
buttons within a certain time limit (generated by the venerable 555) or the
"Lockout" red LED would come on, and the test would fail. You would have to
reset it then. If you were able to follow the buttons successfully for 16
different random LEDs, the "Success" green LED would come on. The idea was
to be able to lock drunks out of their cars, of course.

I waited till the last minute to build it, and was up all night debugging
it. It was the final lab project for a computer architecture class. I
brought it in and, due to my lack of sleep, was unable to get the green
light! The teaching assistant, and about 5 different students tried it out
(there was a big crowd around it, it was like a video game, everybody wanted
to try it out.) They were all failing it (the buttons sucked, but they were
cheap.) This was a test, so they gave you 15 minutes to make a project work,
as I recall. The TA was ready to flunk me until I manged to beat it after a
few more tries. A cheer went up...

Regards,
Bob Monsen

 

[Richard Principal]

Some years ago I made a "cross pulse" monitor with some 555 timers

What is a cross monitor? well all I had to do was to break the Horizontal &
Vertical sync inside the TV and delay the horizontal sync by half a line &
the vertical by half a frame, it made the picture look like shit.

All jokes aside, when you played a VCR and the back tension was normal you
got
|
_|_
|
|

But if the back tension on the VCR was wrong you would get something like

|
_|_
/
|

I needed four 555 altogether, the only problem was the color went in and out
of sync, but it was not for watching TV anyway,

 

[Richard Principal]

Oh sorry
if you are confused the “|” represent the horizontal sync pulse and the “_”
represent the vertical sync pulse.



: Some years ago I made a "cross pulse" monitor with some 555 timers
:
: What is a cross monitor? well all I had to do was to break the Horizontal
&
: Vertical sync inside the TV and delay the horizontal sync by half a line
&
: the vertical by half a frame, it made the picture look like shit.
:
: All jokes aside, when you played a VCR and the back tension was normal you
: got
: |
: _|_
: |
: |
:
: But if the back tension on the VCR was wrong you would get something like
:
: |
: _|_
: /
: |
:
: I needed four 555 altogether, the only problem was the color went in and
out
: of sync, but it was not for watching TV anyway,
:
:

 

[Watson A.Name - Watt Sun, Dark Remover]

http://www.eet.com/special/special_issues/millennium/milestones/camenzind.html

Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

Heh, great story, seems full of twists and turns. All sorts of
nagging questions like, why did he quit and then come back? One
would've thought that the 555 would've come first, since it seems
simpler than a 565. After Signetics found out how popular the 555 was
and how much money it made for them, you'd think they would hire him
back on and keep him from selling his designs to other companies. But
then who ever said that businesses were smart and did the right thing.
Same as The Woz and HP. But if they had've, Forrest Gump wouldn'r
have had that line about buying stock in some fruit company. ;-)

--
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###Got a Question about ELECTRONICS? Check HERE First:###
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My email address is whitelisted. *All* email sent to it
goes directly to the trash unless you add NOSPAM in the
Subject: line with other stuff. alondra101 <at> hotmail.com
Don't be ripped off by the big book dealers. Go to the URL
that will give you a choice and save you money(up to half).
http://www.everybookstore.com You'll be glad you did!
Just when you thought you had all this figured out, the gov't
changed it: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
@@t@h@e@@a@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@m@e@e@t@@t@h@e@@E@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@

 

[warren weber]

I was thumbing thru some old data sheets from Intersil, and I noticed
that in the corner of the 555 data sheet, it daid Feb. 1973. Just out
of curiosity, how long ago did you do your first 555 project? I made
a darkroom timer with one back in '74, I believe. That was the least
used of all my projects. I never saved up enough money to buy any
darkroom equipment!

I recall when I first saw data on the 555, about 1965. The price was $150.00
... This was in a some electronics magazine. or maybe a Poplar Science type
magazine. Warren

 

[Watson A.Name - Watt Sun, Dark Remover]

It's like hacking TV, fun to do, good results but never time to watch it.
Not that there is anything to watch anyway.

You can allways use it to time your boiled eggs.

I don't eat eggs.

As the weatherman predicted, it's raining here in So. Calif. The
scary thought is, what's going to happen to all those thousands of
acres of burnt hillsides. Are they going to turn into lahars?
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=lahar

--
@@F@r@o@m@@O@r@a@n@g@e@@C@o@u@n@t@y@,@@C@a@l@,@@w@h@e@r@e@@
###Got a Question about ELECTRONICS? Check HERE First:###
http://users.pandora.be/educypedia/electronics/databank.htm
My email address is whitelisted. *All* email sent to it
goes directly to the trash unless you add NOSPAM in the
Subject: line with other stuff. alondra101 <at> hotmail.com
Don't be ripped off by the big book dealers. Go to the URL
that will give you a choice and save you money(up to half).
http://www.everybookstore.com You'll be glad you did!
Just when you thought you had all this figured out, the gov't
changed it: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
@@t@h@e@@a@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@m@e@e@t@@t@h@e@@E@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@

 

[Don Pearce]

I don't eat eggs.

As the weatherman predicted, it's raining here in So. Calif. The
scary thought is, what's going to happen to all those thousands of
acres of burnt hillsides. Are they going to turn into lahars?
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=lahar

Burning of heath and wood land is a normal part of the life cycle. It
is preventing the regular occurrence of small fires that leads to
dangerous brush buildup and huge, uncontrolled fires. My bet is that
green shoots will be showing within a couple of weeks, and this time
next year you will have a fine new cover everywhere. As for a lahar -
why would you expect that?

d

_____________________________

http://www.pearce.uk.com

 

[Watson A.Name - Watt Sun, Dark Remover]

I used 555's in a project at work many, many moons ago. Had to be in
'72 or '73. The 555's were wired monostable, controlled some voltages
and signals to a PROM (Poccles(sp?) Readout Optical Memory) cell.
Interesting device. A PROM cell is to an optical image what a latch is
to a binary bit. Ultimately my device was hung on the busines end of
the reflector telescope at Kit Peak Observatory to record images of
.......???? I never knew.

I've read about Kerr cells, but I don't remember anything about
Pockels cells. When you sey business end, do you mean the eyepiece
end? I've seen where the scientist takes two negatives for an image
of the same section of sky taken at different times. He then puts
them on a light table and switches the light between them, looking for
differences in the two images. Stars and galaxies don't move so they
don't change on the images. But planets, asteroids, comets, and the
like can be seen in different places in the two exposures.

Maybe this pockels cell was used to switch the optics of a beam
splitter or something like that. Nowadays the old photograpy methods
have been replaced with sensor arrays like the ones in digital
cameras.

--
@@F@r@o@m@@O@r@a@n@g@e@@C@o@u@n@t@y@,@@C@a@l@,@@w@h@e@r@e@@
###Got a Question about ELECTRONICS? Check HERE First:###
http://users.pandora.be/educypedia/electronics/databank.htm
My email address is whitelisted. *All* email sent to it
goes directly to the trash unless you add NOSPAM in the
Subject: line with other stuff. alondra101 <at> hotmail.com
Don't be ripped off by the big book dealers. Go to the URL
that will give you a choice and save you money(up to half).
http://www.everybookstore.com You'll be glad you did!
Just when you thought you had all this figured out, the gov't
changed it: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
@@t@h@e@@a@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@m@e@e@t@@t@h@e@@E@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@

 

[Watson A.Name - Watt Sun, Dark Remover]

School project 1983, UC Berkeley, I designed and built a 'drunk disabler'
using a 556. It was a series of 10 buttons, with LEDs over them. It had used
a 556 and a couple of counters, if I remember correctly. The system would
flash the LEDs in pseudo random order, and you had to push each of the
buttons within a certain time limit (generated by the venerable 555) or the
"Lockout" red LED would come on, and the test would fail. You would have to
reset it then. If you were able to follow the buttons successfully for 16
different random LEDs, the "Success" green LED would come on. The idea was
to be able to lock drunks out of their cars, of course.

I waited till the last minute to build it, and was up all night debugging
it. It was the final lab project for a computer architecture class. I
brought it in and, due to my lack of sleep, was unable to get the green
light! The teaching assistant, and about 5 different students tried it out
(there was a big crowd around it, it was like a video game, everybody wanted
to try it out.) They were all failing it (the buttons sucked, but they were
cheap.) This was a test, so they gave you 15 minutes to make a project work,
as I recall. The TA was ready to flunk me until I manged to beat it after a
few more tries. A cheer went up...

Regards,
Bob Monsen

ROTFL! Hey, it almost got renamed from a 'drunk disabler' to a
'student flunker'!

Hey, I was almost bumfuzzled by a button today. I checked out a
district vehicle today, a Dodge caravan van. I was stopped at a stop
sign and I noticed that the two dome lights, above the windshield and
rear-view mirror, were on. I didn't turn them on, they must've been
on since the last person used the van yesterday. I looked for a
switch button, around the lights, on the dashboard, etc., but I
couldn't find one! So I forgot about it until I pulled in at the end
of the day, when I again looked all over for a switch but with no
success. I thought that maybe they were disabled by a timer after the
ignition went off, but they still stayed on for the few minutes that I
waited. Finally out of desperation, I tried to take the glass cover
off to remove the bulb, and when I pressed on the glass, it turned
off! Damn! I couldn't believe it!

--
@@F@r@o@m@@O@r@a@n@g@e@@C@o@u@n@t@y@,@@C@a@l@,@@w@h@e@r@e@@
###Got a Question about ELECTRONICS? Check HERE First:###
http://users.pandora.be/educypedia/electronics/databank.htm
My email address is whitelisted. *All* email sent to it
goes directly to the trash unless you add NOSPAM in the
Subject: line with other stuff. alondra101 <at> hotmail.com
Don't be ripped off by the big book dealers. Go to the URL
that will give you a choice and save you money(up to half).
http://www.everybookstore.com You'll be glad you did!
Just when you thought you had all this figured out, the gov't
changed it: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
@@t@h@e@@a@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@m@e@e@t@@t@h@e@@E@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@

 

[Mjolinor]

Burning of heath and wood land is a normal part of the life cycle. It
is preventing the regular occurrence of small fires that leads to
dangerous brush buildup and huge, uncontrolled fires. My bet is that
green shoots will be showing within a couple of weeks, and this time
next year you will have a fine new cover everywhere. As for a lahar -
why would you expect that?

A few years ago in the UK (and europe) they made it illegal for farmers to
burn, they have done this once a year for ever. Now the whole of the country
is in a state where if a fire starts then it burns for months instead of
burning itself out in a few days. This situation is going to carry on
getting worse. Another example of the wonderful centralised government that
we seem to be building for ourselves.

 

[Watson A.Name - Watt Sun, Dark Remover]

Burning of heath and wood land is a normal part of the life cycle. It
is preventing the regular occurrence of small fires that leads to
dangerous brush buildup and huge, uncontrolled fires. My bet is that
green shoots will be showing within a couple of weeks, and this time
next year you will have a fine new cover everywhere. As for a lahar -
why would you expect that?

Actually they wouldn't be volcanic ash, just rivers of ashes from
burned brush and trees coming down the gullies.

The huge uncontrolled fires in the forests are being caused by the
bark beetles, which killed the trees weakened by the drought. Those
dead trees, which are normally evergreen, turned into giant torches.
That certainly is _not_ a 'normal part of the life cycle"!!
http://ohioline.osu.edu/hyg-fact/2000/2557.html

d

--
@@F@r@o@m@@O@r@a@n@g@e@@C@o@u@n@t@y@,@@C@a@l@,@@w@h@e@r@e@@
###Got a Question about ELECTRONICS? Check HERE First:###
http://users.pandora.be/educypedia/electronics/databank.htm
My email address is whitelisted. *All* email sent to it
goes directly to the trash unless you add NOSPAM in the
Subject: line with other stuff. alondra101 <at> hotmail.com
Don't be ripped off by the big book dealers. Go to the URL
that will give you a choice and save you money(up to half).
http://www.everybookstore.com You'll be glad you did!
Just when you thought you had all this figured out, the gov't
changed it: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
@@t@h@e@@a@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@m@e@e@t@@t@h@e@@E@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@

 

[Don Pearce]

Actually they wouldn't be volcanic ash, just rivers of ashes from
burned brush and trees coming down the gullies.

The huge uncontrolled fires in the forests are being caused by the
bark beetles, which killed the trees weakened by the drought. Those
dead trees, which are normally evergreen, turned into giant torches.
That certainly is _not_ a 'normal part of the life cycle"!!
http://ohioline.osu.edu/hyg-fact/2000/2557.html

I think we must allow bugs to be part of the natural cycle. And of
course one of the results of the burn is that the bugs are gone - so
you get a whole clean new growth.

d

_____________________________

http://www.pearce.uk.com

 

[Spehro Pefhany]

I think we must allow bugs to be part of the natural cycle. And of
course one of the results of the burn is that the bugs are gone - so
you get a whole clean new growth.

Mudslides and flooding are also part of the natural cycle- you want to
let them take their course too?

Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany