They call me Papa Joe!

@papajoe0418 Welcome to the forum Papa Joe. Maybe consider a Raspberry PICO, the cost is under $5. The biggest cost will be power regardless of hardware.

Hi @papajoe0418,

  Welcome .. I hope you find this a friendly and helpful forum.

  We generally recommend that technical discussions are given their own threads in appropriate sections, but I hope no one will mind if I make an observation on your suggestion.

555/556 timers are obviously based on analogue RC timing circuits. Whilst I suspect you can make a reasonable 1 hour delay, I think the 24 hour delay to trigger nightly might be more challenging, especially if subject to significant temperature changes, unless you are able to 'reset' their timing cycle on a frequent basis.

I can understand your cost considerations if you are looking at 'genuine' Arduinos, but as Ron (@zander) has suggested, there are a large number of low cost clones and spin offs, many of which can be programmed and connected in the same way, including using the Arduino IDE if you wish. They will typically use crystal or related resonators for timing, which can be much more reliable and accurate. Of course, this approach is much more complex than a 556, but perhaps only a few dollars more.

50 years ago, when the 555 was a new device, a long delay like 24 hours might have been constructed with a 555 oscillator, and some binary/decimal counting devices from the 74xxx series or similar ... now it is cheaper, smaller and more convenient to use a complete computing device!

As I said, it is only a suggestion ... you may strike lucky with a 556 solution!

Best wishes, Dave

@zander Thanks for this. I have not looked into the Pico but if it's inexpensive, I don't object to flexible programming vs trial-and-error with breadboard component values.

@davee Thanks for this. You've given me a lot to think about and between you and Ron, I do believe I'm swayed in the sensible direction. Also, I'll take the tip from you and remember to find the right discussion forum for tech talk, once I get that far along in my process.

Hi Papa Joe,

Welcome to the forum.  If you can't get your project sorted out with just a 555 circuit, there are many cheaper 
"Arduino" type boards for much cheaper.  I just checked Amazon and found one third party Nanos as cheap as $9 US and, if you can use more than one, I saw one listing that included four third party Nanos for about $22 US.  You also have the option of putting together the key components of an Arduino yourself for much cheaper.  Bill's video

Is a good starting point.  I haven't tried this yet, but I have purchased the components and have a project that works on an Arduino UNO that I plan to try.

Good luck.

@tberrykev Thanks for this, Kevin. Loving the video! I look forward to documenting this project's progress in the appropriate area of this forum. Cheers!