In this article I will tell you how to make a simple mechanical TV, with simple electrical control circuits.This “TV” will show simple images.If you want to make a high-quality mechanical TV, look at the articles on the Internet.
The basis of the TV is the Nipkov disk.It is a circle with holes.I will make a disk with 24 holes, which will correspond to a 24-line TV, it is better to download a disk drawing file on the Internet with the exact locations of the holes, because the more accurately you make the Nipkov disk, the clearer the images will be.
I took thick paper for the disk.I drew a circle from a plate with a diameter of about 22 cm, but you can also take another circle with a larger or slightly smaller diameter
To find exactly the center of the circle and the exact location of the four radii, take a circle of paper of exactly the same size and fold it as shown in the photo
Now expand the circle and you will see the center of the circle.Mark with an awl or needle on thick paper the center of the circle and the place where the four radii end
Draw two lines that will pass through the center of the circle.You can see that the circle is divided into exactly four sides of 90 degrees each.
Since I’m making a TV with 24 holes, I need to divide 360 degrees of the circle by 24, which turns out to be 15.Attach the protractor to the center of the circle and mark the points on the circle every 15 centimeters
it turned out exactly 24 points on the circle
now take and draw straight lines from the points through the center of the circle.There should be exactly 24 lines
Take one first line, it can be any line and step back 10 millimeters from the edge of the circle and at this point make a hole in the circle with a needle.On the other adjacent line, step back already 11 millimeters and also make a hole.On the other line, step back 12 mm and so on
The result was a Nipkow disk with 24 holes.Paint the disc with dark paint, pierce the holes again with a needle or awl
The Nipkow disk must rotate at a certain speed.This speed must be adjusted.Make a simple fan speed controller on one transistor
I used a fan from a computer at a voltage of 5 Volts.It is convenient to glue a Nipkow disk on such a fan, which is what you need to do
The disk will be illuminated with LEDs from below.The LED will receive a special signal that will come from the MP3/WAV file player.The signal from the player needs to be amplified, to do this, assemble a simple signal amplifier circuit.But you need to know that this circuit inverts the signal, that is, the image will be inverted 180 degrees.To prevent this from happening, you can assemble an amplifier on a non-inverting amplifier on an operational amplifier.
This is how it will look like.The LED is better to take a white glow color and it is better that it is made of several LEDs such as an LED matrix from a flashlight.
To translate an image into an audio file, a special computer program is needed for this.You can download this program from this link https://www.taswegian.com/NBTV/forum/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=2458&hilit=freenbtv&start=15
The program file is called freeNBTV-alpha2-install.exe .I installed the program on Windows 10 and there were no problems
How to use this program.In Photoshop, I made a simple image of a capacitor in jpeg format.This image should be inserted into the program window
The program should show your inserted image.On the right side is the image that the mechanical TV will show
set 24 lines
At the beginning, listen to how your file will sound.To do this, click on “SET format” and “start”.While listening to the file, you will be able to adjust it, for example, change pixels, etc.
To save a file on your computer, move the icon from “Audio device” to “File”.Click “SET format” and “start”.The file will be saved in the “Programm files” folder in the NBTV program itself on the computer
Install the audio file on the player and send a signal from it to the input of the amplifier for the LED
Spin the Nipkow disk until the image is clearly visible.As you can see, the TV shows an image of a capacitor. Wow.
In my video you will be able to see in detail how it all needs to be done
