This won’t mean much to anyone but I have it (IVL2-7/5) working. Trying to understand Russian datasheets on the IVL2-7/5 VFD and piecing together bits of info from around the web and I have it working. It was like some sort of secret/puzzle that you had to pass to be accepted by other engineers. I have that same feeling I had with A Blinking Red LED. Yeah Baby!
Get the IVL2-7/5 Datasheets Here
Looking forward to more detailed post. I also have a few of them lying around but I didn’t find the time to try them yet. Do you want to use yours with an ATmega?
I will post more details later, but for now you can check out more info on the http://loststeak.com/ivl2-75-vfd-datasheets/ here.
And I’m not using an ATmega to drive it, I’ll be using a Microchip PIC18F(something that I have lying around) chip to drive it.
I just got one. I will be driving it with a KR145IK1901 soviet digital clock IC.
I used the MAX6920 VDF Display Driver. It worked really well. It has all the charge pumps built in, and all you have to is multiplex the channels for each digit.