What to do with 118 CD4013 Chips? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / projects

author: TheGreatGooglyMoogly
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2017, 09:57:27 pm
content: Over time I've acquired 118 CD4013 dual flip-flop chips as well as a fair amount of standard 40xx and 74xx logic.The question is what are some fun project ideas, that ideally use all 118 of the flip-flops chips.Open to any ideas lol. Have breadboards, perf boards and a lab full of test equipment.All the chips are DIPLooking forward to fun fun fun!

author: tpowell1830
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2017, 10:04:39 pm
content: Pinball machine?

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2017, 10:29:39 pm
content: The difficulty in a pinball machine is building the electromechanical parts, the electronics are easy. A few years ago I implemented most of the electronics of the early 80s Gottlieb pinball hardware in VHDL as an exercise, it was based on a 6502 microprocessor.If you want to build something with flip flops, how about a counter? Clock? Stopwatch? Memory?

author: orolo
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2017, 10:52:21 pm
content: Quote from: james_s on March 08, 2017, 10:29:39 pmA heat death wake up alarm: a 32768 clock at one side of the 236 flip flops,a red led at the other. By the time it lights up, it will be the brightest light in the universe.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2017, 11:13:38 pm
content: Not sure what you'd use for a power supply that will be resilient enough to ever need that LED.

author: TheGreatGooglyMoogly
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2017, 11:39:12 pm
content: What happens if you observe the LED light up...?

author: technix
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 12:01:07 am
content: You can try building a 8-bit CPU out of those. Try add a MMU. And then try put xv6 (a modern reimplementation - read using ISO C99 - of UNIX Version 6) on it. Bonus point if you can get Linux 4.10 there.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 12:27:06 am
content: A simple LED clock would be pretty good. Takes a modest number of latches, a lot of wiring, and a little ingenuity to figure out where to put everything.Not that latches/flops solve all the problems of such a circuit, but a flop-heavy solution could be interesting.Hey, it's been done with diodes. You're not going to letdiodesoutshine classic CMOS, are you?Tim

author: technix
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 12:29:35 am
content: Quote from: T3sl4co1l on March 09, 2017, 12:27:06 amDiodes?!? Latches and muxes using diodes?

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 01:05:05 am
content: Quote from: technix on March 09, 2017, 12:29:35 amhttps://hackaday.io/project/11677-the-diode-clockIIRC it's dynamic logic using an AC supply, and reverse recovery. It could also be built with ferrite cores, and fewer diodes.Tim

author: joeqsmith
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 01:25:53 am
content: I've got a box of old DIP parts that still turn to from time to time. I recently needed a 60Hz source and just built it out of old CMOS parts.You could try to make something like a frequency counter. Maybe some nice features like event counting, period vs freq.

author: technix
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 01:48:39 pm
content: Wait. Did this guy just solve the MOS feature size limit?If such diode-based logic is synthesizable, Schottky barriers and small inductors can be printed using the usual CMOS photolithography process and the circuit have a manageable power draw, we may be able to build CPU chips with a minimum frequency requirement of a few GHz at a feature size of single-digit nanometers with DDL internals."Introducing Intel Core i7-9770K hexa-core mainstream performance processor with 4nm DDL process, and a base clock of 7GHz and boost clock of 7.5GHz. It can mostly be overclocked to over 10GHz easily."

author: danadak
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 02:20:45 pm
content: Bury them in the back yard for the archaeologists to ponder in 10,000 years.Regards, Dana.

author: HSPalm
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 02:44:41 pm
content: You can sell them on aliexpress for five bucks...https://www.aliexpress.com/item/XIN-YANG-Electronic-100pcs-lot-New-CD4013BM-CD4013-SOP-14-Logic-trigger/32650773542.html

author: grumpydoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 03:11:50 pm
content: Quote from: james_s on March 08, 2017, 11:13:38 pmAnything.with 236 flip-flops and a 32768Hz clock that LED is going to light in about 1059years.That's 6x1048times the current age of the universe so we will probably have hit the "big crunch" way before then.As no-one is ever going to see the LED light up, you might as well connect the whole system to a stone - the ultimate effect will be the same

author: orolo
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 03:46:56 pm
content: Quote from: grumpydoc on March 09, 2017, 03:11:50 pmOn the contrary, there lies the greatness of this project! I envision the device as a relic of unknown origin, surviving the eons passing from sentient species to sentient species, galaxy to galaxy, leaving behind a trail of several solar masses in depleted batteries. Sages countless will ponder on the runes carved in the blocky ICs. Fanatical cults will care after the device, guarding it from glitches caused by proton decay and offering bloody sacrifies. Until 1059years in the future, when the last sentient species, wispy things made of pure energy barely surviving on the last few scraps of heat to be harvested from pure disorder, will gather around the artifact to witness the final tick... and be annihilated by the scorching light of the red LED.The definitive electronic gadget. You should auction it on ebay, starting the endless chain: "mysterious alien doomsday artifact (battery powered)".

author: TheGreatGooglyMoogly
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 07:47:11 pm
content: I was also thinking I could make a 236 bit random number generator... Need a few XOR gates lol

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 08:24:47 pm
content: Quote from: technix on March 09, 2017, 01:48:39 pmHmm, interesting thought.I don't think it's possible, though. AFAIK, it depends on reverse recovery, which will take some um of height and width, and distance and/or isolation trenches between diodes. It's also a lossy process, so it might have similar process and thermal limitations to the last runs of NMOS.And with detectors and filters, I don't think it would be very amenable to high clock rates, though that is something that can be controlled at least: I'd suppose 1N4001s could be replaced with 1N914s (or even smaller and faster PN diodes), and 1N914s replaced with RF schottkys, using an excitation source of a few GHz, and a usable logic rate on the order of some 100s MHz.Personally, I look forward to ~10nm lossless CMOS: the chip is biphase clocked, with nice smooth sine waves or whatever, and there's a data input, data output, and an "entropy dump". (The "dump" is necessary, because all computations must be reversible, e.g., using Toffoli or Fredkin gates. Eventually, some unwanted data must be discarded, making the computation irreversible; hence, "entropy dump".) This would also be the perfect design lead-in to full quantum computing, which is also reversible.Since it's lossless, there's no need for a supply rail, and the clock lines look largely capacitive. (The gates effectively connect or disconnect data lines from the clock lines, so voltage transitions are always carried by the clocks.) Losses arise from the usual sources, but also any irreversible calculations. The clock lines therefore look like lossy capacitors, so you'd use a resonant supply to power the circuit. The entropy dump might just be some resistors. (It shouldn't be possible to recycle the "entropy" energy, but maybe it's okay to use some diodes to get some back.)The important feature being, though the logic is bigger (you're passing more signals in and out of each gate, and the gates need more transistors), you can integrate it as high as you want, with little concern for overheating. This, of course, depends critically on having some efficient way to grow stacked circuits, which simply doesn't exist right now...Tim

author: TheGreatGooglyMoogly
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2017, 09:27:13 pm
content: Another idea I had is to make a hardware Conway's game of life... if I ever get around to a) cleaning the lab like i'm supposed to and b) not reading about diodes lol