Where did all VFDs go?

[karoru]

I wanted something a bit more nice than usual 4$ green or blue LCD so I was looking for a nice VFD, but it seems they became a rare piece of kit.

There's something strange, I can buy Chinese car radio with VFD for 10 bucks at my local shopping mall, but when I visit Farnell/Mouser/TME I get a heart attack looking at prices - 40$ for cheapest 2x16 display.

Any ideas where to find (I'd prefer European vendor) el cheapo VFDs in small quantities? Preferably ones that have at least semi-documented interface protocol (or I'll really could start salvaging Wang Hung Lou radios ). I must be feeding the mighty google with wrong phrases.

[Aodhan145]

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/lcd-display-module-8-bit-fluorescent-vfd-display-ic-develope-new-diy-c3-/381611878961?hash=item58d9d72a31:g:mnYAAOSwgn5XEsRE

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/noritake-itron-vfd-display-GU128x64-800A-/172207759343?hash=item281861dfef:g:Ke8AAOSwr0ZXOK8o

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/electronic-display-NORITAKE-ITRON-VFD-MODULE-1-X-16-lines-/182130024796?hash=item2a67cba15c:g:g80AAOSw1vlUtqHn

and so on. Farnell is a bad place to look for things like this always check ebay.

[uncle_bob]

I wanted something a bit more nice than usual 4$ green or blue LCD so I was looking for a nice VFD, but it seems they became a rare piece of kit.

There's something strange, I can buy Chinese car radio with VFD for 10 bucks at my local shopping mall, but when I visit Farnell/Mouser/TME I get a heart attack looking at prices - 40$ for cheapest 2x16 display.

Any ideas where to find (I'd prefer European vendor) el cheapo VFDs in small quantities? Preferably ones that have at least semi-documented interface protocol (or I'll really could start salvaging Wang Hung Lou radios ). I must be feeding the mighty google with wrong phrases.

Hi

If you look at your car radio display, it's probably not a standard part. It's got special symbols on it for the radio functions. That's true of most (like 99%) of the VFD displays you see. They don't fit into a normal distribution model (Digikey / Farnel / Mouser).

Bob

[Aodhan145]

I wanted something a bit more nice than usual 4$ green or blue LCD so I was looking for a nice VFD, but it seems they became a rare piece of kit.

There's something strange, I can buy Chinese car radio with VFD for 10 bucks at my local shopping mall, but when I visit Farnell/Mouser/TME I get a heart attack looking at prices - 40$ for cheapest 2x16 display.

Any ideas where to find (I'd prefer European vendor) el cheapo VFDs in small quantities? Preferably ones that have at least semi-documented interface protocol (or I'll really could start salvaging Wang Hung Lou radios ). I must be feeding the mighty google with wrong phrases.

There is a perfect example the only VFD I have at the minute is clearly for an oven.

Hi

If you look at your car radio display, it's probably not a standard part. It's got special symbols on it for the radio functions. That's true of most (like 99%) of the VFD displays you see. They don't fit into a normal distribution model (Digikey / Farnel / Mouser).

Bob

[karoru]

That sounds like a neat display for bench meter or PSU, that steaming thing in middle to signal overload ;p

[uncle_bob]

I wanted something a bit more nice than usual 4$ green or blue LCD so I was looking for a nice VFD, but it seems they became a rare piece of kit.

There's something strange, I can buy Chinese car radio with VFD for 10 bucks at my local shopping mall, but when I visit Farnell/Mouser/TME I get a heart attack looking at prices - 40$ for cheapest 2x16 display.

Any ideas where to find (I'd prefer European vendor) el cheapo VFDs in small quantities? Preferably ones that have at least semi-documented interface protocol (or I'll really could start salvaging Wang Hung Lou radios ). I must be feeding the mighty google with wrong phrases.

There is a perfect example the only VFD I have at the minute is clearly for an oven.

Hi

If you look at your car radio display, it's probably not a standard part. It's got special symbols on it for the radio functions. That's true of most (like 99%) of the VFD displays you see. They don't fit into a normal distribution model (Digikey / Farnel / Mouser).

Bob

Hi

The next layer to the problem: I design in the display that I *finally* found. It works, it's great, the first couple are going fine. I go back a while later to build a few more gizmos and *surprise* the display is no longer available. That's not specific to VFD's. It applies to a lot of displays. The more custom, the more likely they are to go away ...

Bob

[AndyC_772]

Common problem. Trust me, it happens to companies much, much bigger than the likes of you and me. If your chosen display isn't used in some high volume consumer product, it'll be expensive, and if it is, it'll be discontinued as soon as that other product reaches EoL.

Personally I wouldn't touch VFD; I'd go for an OLED display if being different and eye-catching is important. The latest ones have much, much longer lifetimes than early units which seem to have given the technology a bad reputation in that respect... and it's not as though VFD lasts forever either.

[uncle_bob]

Common problem. Trust me, it happens to companies much, much bigger than the likes of you and me. If your chosen display isn't used in some high volume consumer product, it'll be expensive, and if it is, it'll be discontinued as soon as that other product reaches EoL.

Personally I wouldn't touch VFD; I'd go for an OLED display if being different and eye-catching is important. The latest ones have much, much longer lifetimes than early units which seem to have given the technology a bad reputation in that respect... and it's not as though VFD lasts forever either.

Hi

Given the number of HP instruments I have around here with weak VFD's I'd say they have a *very* finite life. The LED and LCD displays that came before them seem to be doing better life wise.

Bob

[bktemp]

Personally I wouldn't touch VFD; I'd go for an OLED display if being different and eye-catching is important. The latest ones have much, much longer lifetimes than early units which seem to have given the technology a bad reputation in that respect... and it's not as though VFD lasts forever either.

It depends on the quality and the brightness setting. I have seen really bad OLEDs lasting less than 100 hours at the recommended brightness setting until the active area was clearly distinguishable from unused pixels and I have seen good ones lasting >20000 hours doing the same test. From my experience I would recommend LCDs or VFDs because they are proven technology.
OLED displays have really improved in the last 10 years, but they are still not ready for industrial or automotive applications, especially at elevated temperatures.

[Kjelt]

The VFD's are already very expensive for the last 5 years.
Too little producers, too little demand.
Other displays that are also becoming obsolete/extremely expensive are the integrated 4 or 8 position alfanumeric LED modules like the HDSP25xx series, a shame actually, I have bought ten of them around 1998 for 5.- a piece, made by HP and Osram, now they are 30.- to 50.- a piece from Broadcom. 

http://nl.farnell.com/avago-technologies/hdsp-2502/led-display-alphanumeric/dp/1175570

[German_EE]

I used to service and repair elevators and about half the models we worked on used VFD modules to indicate the floor numbers. Their working life was about two years (remember that they would have been working 24/7) and in the end we just gave up and had an LED module manufactured as a direct plug in replacement.

Fast forward to 2016 and I'm now building all my own test and ham radio equipment. None of them have VFDs in them because I don't want to find them unobtainable if one of them dies, I bought a tube of HP/Avago High Efficiency LEDs and these are used in all of my projects to give a uniform look and feel.

My advice, walk away, the VFD working life is too short.

[karoru]

Well, I'm wondering about trying to give OLED a go, my main reason for trying to find a cheap VFDs is that I hate with passion these 2x16 LCD displays with pathetic view angles (and I don't consider variations like light blue on dark blue to be sensible text display colors) that tend to be way to go nowadays with any hobby project. I hope that at least 7-segment LED displays (which are still surpisingly cheap) won't go away soon, but I have ample supply of 3-digit ones and handful of CD4511's, so at least for one-offs it will last me forever;)

From datasheet adventures I can see that besides car radios & kitchen ovens main application of VFDs nowadays are Pachinko machines (most of character displays have Japanese font with some another funny symbols included) and that would explain the price a bit for these vanilla ones.

[ebclr]

https://world.taobao.com/item/9067846370.htm?spm=a312a.7700714.0.0.V6SJkN#detail

And works i already bought

[chris_leyson]

I gave up on VFDs years ago, I like the colours of the phosphors, viewing angle is good, available in numeric, alpha numeric, dot matrix, bar graph and custom formats, they're still used on point of sale terminals and on cash registers. They're relatively easy to manufacture, print the electrodes then the phosphor, align grids and heater supports then frit seal maybe and vacuum pump. Something like that. It's all glass, metal, phosphor, cathodes and vacuum. Custon CRT in other words, same technology except scanning mechanism is different, it's fixed.

The down side is the short life of the phosphor and also cathode emission. You have to run the cathodes relatively cool compared to a standard vaccuum tube so maybe cathode coatings "boiling off" or something like that, you would have to ask the people that design this sort of stuff. Field emission electrodes were researched but never happened. Also, there is a diminishing amout of plant to manufacture glass vacuum tube technology.

Seems like Toshiba still putting VFDs into their tills but other manufactures use LCD now.

[Zero999]

I've wondered why they still make VFDs these days, given they're much cheaper alternatives which are easier to drive.

[bitseeker]

For legibility and long life, definitely go with segment- or dot-based LED displays. Although it's good to hear that OLED longevity is improving, I wouldn't use them unless you need the full array (e.g., for showing arbitrary graphics).

Surprisingly, the VFDs in my kitchen microwave and conventional ovens are over 18 years old (that's 150,000+ hours) and still look great despite being on 24x7 displaying the current time. You can tell which segments get the most on-time, but the difference in brightness is no where near as bad as many of the displays I've seen on test equipment.

[Fsck]

I've wondered why they still make VFDs these days, given they're much cheaper alternatives which are easier to drive.

they still have use at extreme temperatures. you can generally read a non-crap vfd at -50C through to 90C and it will have a decent lifetime.

[alank2]

http://noritake-vfd.com/currentpromotion.aspx

They also have a discount tab with some decent prices.  VFD's are generally not cheap unless you get them on closeout.

[Zero999]

I've wondered why they still make VFDs these days, given they're much cheaper alternatives which are easier to drive.

they still have use at extreme temperatures. you can generally read a non-crap vfd at -50C through to 90C and it will have a decent lifetime.

Yes, that's true and VFDs will be able to withstand ionising radiation better than LCD or LED. However these are niche, applications. Most displays don't need to withstand such a harsh environment.

[Alexei.Polkhanov]

I've wondered why they still make VFDs these days, given they're much cheaper alternatives which are easier to drive.

VFDs are very expensive comparable to LCD and other diode-based displays but I still like VFD - they have that sexy bright look that lasts for many years and works well even in bright sunlight. Just Love them.

[coppice]

I've wondered why they still make VFDs these days, given they're much cheaper alternatives which are easier to drive.

VFDs are very expensive comparable to LCD and other diode-based displays but I still like VFD - they have that sexy bright look that lasts for many years and works well even in bright sunlight. Just Love them.

Obviously its their high price that still gets VFDs into some very cheap products where an LCD would be perfectly suitable.

[ebclr]

VFD now days are a very cheap you can easily find 8 alpha characters for less than a dollar.

And with pt6312 IC is very easy and cheap to drive

In reality is nice and cheaper than LCD, the disadvantage is that is heavy adding some weight to your device

[karoru]

I've wondered why they still make VFDs these days, given they're much cheaper alternatives which are easier to drive.

VFDs are very expensive comparable to LCD and other diode-based displays but I still like VFD - they have that sexy bright look that lasts for many years and works well even in bright sunlight. Just Love them.

Yup, I actually like idea of display that actually lights the thing that has to be bright, not filter the light that's unwanted;)

[uncle_bob]

VFD now days are a very cheap you can easily find 8 alpha characters for less than a dollar.

And with pt6312 IC is very easy and cheap to drive

In reality is nice and cheaper than LCD, the disadvantage is that is heavy adding some weight to your device

Hi

Eight digit LED's seem to sell for under 5 cents each ....

Bob

[macboy]

I wanted something a bit more nice than usual 4$ green or blue LCD so I was looking for a nice VFD, but it seems they became a rare piece of kit.

There's something strange, I can buy Chinese car radio with VFD for 10 bucks at my local shopping mall, but when I visit Farnell/Mouser/TME I get a heart attack looking at prices - 40$ for cheapest 2x16 display.

Any ideas where to find (I'd prefer European vendor) el cheapo VFDs in small quantities? Preferably ones that have at least semi-documented interface protocol (or I'll really could start salvaging Wang Hung Lou radios ). I must be feeding the mighty google with wrong phrases.

I bought some of these http://www.ebay.com/itm/221946221520 and they are nice. They just fit (width) into a half rack width case. Only issue is the need for a >=16 VAC (>= 20 VDC) supply in addition to 5 V. This can be solved with a $1 ebay boost converter. They have a ribbon cable attached but the unpopulated 18 pin header is equivalent. They are compatible with HD44780 protocol.