Father Time

So i got my RTC (real time clock) chip today,  the nifty little DS1307 (Jameco part number : 1194679) , seen right next to a 3v coin cell batter ( 14162) and battery holder (355434). I ordered this i think it was on friday and got it on monday, not too shabby.

So I wired it up , i am awful at understanding datasheets but this one was pretty simple.  Where X1 and X2 is for a crystal/tuning fork which i also got from Jameco (325244) I basically Looked at the Ladyada tutorial for the RTC and  ordered all the parts except the breakout board because its not necessary, it just for looks in my opinion.
The Ladyada tutorial is here.

Aside from the power , ground and crystal connections i was not quite sure where everything else went. then somewhere alone the lines , i do not remember where or else i would give proper credit, i was directed to the Arduino  Wire  library which is how Arduino talks to "I2C / TWI devices" Then right there in the second sentence it said that "SDA/data line" is on analog input pin 4  and the "SCL clock" line is on analog input pin 5. After my enlightenment i pulled up the RTCLibrary which to be honest i dont know if that came with Arduino because i have quite the collection of Libraries that i dont know which are the ones that came with the IDE. If you would like a copy of my libraries send me an email i can use to send an invite for my DropBox account so you can share my files.

My Original idea was to make a clock with a custom built Arduino
to fit inside an acrylic case, which i would of course make my self.
The coolest part is those digits you see right there are are Russian Vacume Florecent Displays, which if i am not mistaken are no longer in production, theres only whats left from the old days.
Another problem is that these babies are very high voltage devices im talking 50-70 volts. Thats something i am not comfortable with yet.
Not trying to burn the house down. Or worst hurt my self.










So i will have to settle for some new school 7 segment led display.
Anyways back to RTC chip, its pretty straight forward, you include the RTC library call a " now.hour() " function and it returns the hour. The chip has a way of converting from 24 hour to 12 hour modes which do not know of yet but a simple if statement can solve that as well as the Am or Pm conversion. 
If you connect the 3v coin cell batter to the chip it can keep time for about 5 years. So if the battery on my Arduino or power source gets unplugged as long as the 3v batter is still connected to the chip it will keep time just right so when i turn on my Arduino again it will be on point.

My next project hopefully start and finish this same weekend will be adding ambient lights to friends car. She wants lights under her seats, something subtle  not too fancy or bright. So lets look forward to that.