##About The kids bought a handful of old school 4 digit 7 segment bubble displays. They are low power, and perfect for adding scrolling text displays to your electronics projects.

One display takes up 12 GPIO outputs on our Raspberry Pi so it was an ideal opportunity to learn about shift registers. At 50pence each they didn't make much of a hole in their pocket money, and we managed to drive 2 bubble displays (8 digits) with only 3 GPIO pins. You could drive even more if you wanted.

You could use the shift registers to operate an LED matrix, a row of regular LEDs or make your own 4 digit 7 segment diaplay from 4 of the common 7 segment numberical displays.

Code is Python, and the wiring is explained. It's a very simple project, ideal for kids. We'd love to get our hands on a TSA1605A and do something similar.

Ingredients HP QDSP-6064 bubble display 1 or more about £2 SN74HC595 shift register 50 pence or 25 for £1.96 on banggood.com 8x 330 Ohm resitors