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What are the most interesting vacuum tubes in your collection?

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Finn Hammer

Mon Feb 21 2011, 08:56PM

Registered Member #205 Joined: Sat Feb 18 2006, 11:59AM
Location: SkÃ¸rping, Denmark
Posts: 741

Steve McConner wrote ...

Finn, are you still using that beautiful 300B hi-fi amp I saw when I visited you in Denmark?

You mean this one:

Sure!

Cheers, Finn Hammer

radhoo

Mon Feb 21 2011, 11:16PM

Registered Member #1938 Joined: Sun Jan 25 2009, 12:44PM
Location: Romania
Posts: 699

Nice one, Finn!
Anders, that's an impressive collection of x-ray tubes! Did you find a gold mine with X-ray tubes somewhere?

Another tube, a voltage regulator, Sylvania VR150 :

Proud Mary

Wed Feb 23 2011, 08:07PM

Registered Member #543 Joined: Tue Feb 20 2007, 04:26PM
Location: UK
Posts: 4992

For anyone suffering from indigestion after Anders' medical monstrosities above, here at last is the low fat X-ray tube you can use between meals!

The micro-focus transmission target BS-7 thrives on a calorie-conscious 20mW, works across 5kV - 15kV in grounded anode mode, and needs just 1.2V on the filament, a perfect match for NiMH cells.

BS-7 has a focal spot of just 0.0017mm, and the beryllium exit window passes X-rays down to 5keV, perfect for the girl who wants to image a mosquito's wing.

The transmission target is a tungsten nanolayer, so this is a tube which will fail almost at once if its tiny dissipation rating is exceeded.

Mads Barnkob

Wed Feb 23 2011, 08:43PM

Registered Member #1403 Joined: Tue Mar 18 2008, 06:05PM
Location: Denmark, Odense C
Posts: 1968

This is my one of my favourite tubes in my collection, its a nice fat boy capable of outputting 3kW :)

The QB5/2000

radhoo

Thu Feb 24 2011, 08:15PM

Registered Member #1938 Joined: Sun Jan 25 2009, 12:44PM
Location: Romania
Posts: 699

The ancestor of CCD sensors, here is an Amperex 8483 Vidicon (Video Camera) tube. These devices, similar to the CRT , where capable of transforming an image into an electrical signal!

wikipedia page here:

Steve Conner

Sat Feb 26 2011, 09:26PM

Registered Member #30 Joined: Fri Feb 03 2006, 10:52AM
Location: Glasgow, Scotland
Posts: 6706

Finn, yep, that's the one. I finally got round to building one too. Couldn't dumpster dive any 300Bs, so KT88s had to do.

It's push-pull and about 30W per channel.

The GEC KT88s in there are some of the most interesting tubes in my collection, too. I got 6 from two scrapped Brandenburg power supplies, and a seventh one was given to me by a friend. Out of that lot I was able to make two matched pairs.

Nah

Mon Feb 28 2011, 11:40PM

Registered Member #3567 Joined: Mon Jan 03 2011, 10:49PM
Location: USA, 1960s
Posts: 260

You guys have all the fun, I only have $100 globe radio tubes. Eye tubes anyone?:-(

radhoo

Tue Mar 01 2011, 10:33AM

Registered Member #1938 Joined: Sun Jan 25 2009, 12:44PM
Location: Romania
Posts: 699

MA340F, I don't know much about this tube (still need to get Sibley's Tube Lore), but I think it was used in a radar after the WW2:

This tube is marked as radioactive, probably it was manufactured with a tiny amount of Cesium 137, but today it shows no radioactivity.

LE: " ... a TR cell, a device used to protect the receiver portion of a microwave transceiver which shares the same antenna for both transmit and receive functions. A TR cell functions like a triggered gap tube, and blocks the receiver hardware by shorting the receiver input during transmitter operation. Transmitter pulses cause the spark gap to break down, shorting the receiver input. "

Nicko

Tue Mar 01 2011, 04:27PM

Registered Member #1334 Joined: Tue Feb 19 2008, 04:37PM
Location: Nr. London, UK
Posts: 615

I don't normally get my tubes out in public, but here's something you won't see very often - a CK1414-07 "Symbolray" character generation tube (sometimes called a "monoscope" but not a "charactron" - that was something else [but similar]).

The CK1414s series were used to generate characters & symbols for RADAR & other systems - they contain a scanning electron gun (electrostatic deflection) and a symbol mask with an output collector. The -07 suffix determines the mask that's in this tube - I've never seen another "-07" variant... It's a beast - about a foot long...

Edit: I should point out that the mask could be whatever you wanted - e.g. a test card for a quiesced TV channel or a message "Normal service will be resumed soon" for a studio problem, or even the outline of an airfield for a radar overlay...

Each tube has an individual serial number - mine is NIB and came in a job lot of otherwise uninteresting junk...

]ck1414.pdf[/file] (if you read the end of the datasheet it explains how it works - very cunning!)

radhoo

Tue Mar 01 2011, 04:43PM

Registered Member #1938 Joined: Sun Jan 25 2009, 12:44PM
Location: Romania
Posts: 699

Nice one, Nicko!

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