Spotted on Ebay: B6091/NL8423 nixies (larger 20mm/0.8 inch). Manufactured 1985

[gregebert]

These are noticeably larger than the more-common 0.6" b5092s.

Not my auction, but I bought a lot of 6 (new-in box/mint condition). Apparently the seller has a stockpile.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/6-PIECES-NOS-type-6091-8423-NATIONAL-NIXIE-TUBES-Large-Top-View-GUARANTEED-NEW-/172657232661?hash=item28332c4b15:g:-KAAAOSwo4pYl55u

I was surprised to see the 8522 date-code; the only other tubes I've encountered that were manufactured more recently are from the USSR.

[chuck richards]

Great! Just looked them up and yes, they have the .808 inch tall
characters. If you don't mind me asking, what's the going price of
these
6091/8423 tubes?

Chuck

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[Terry S]

They are Richardson tubes, wasn't Richardson known for re-marking tubes with the date code corresponding to the time of re-boxing?

Terry

[gregebert]

Terry- I wouldn't be surprised if they were re-dated. 1985 seemed too recent, as LEDs & VFDs were churned-out like jelly beans at that time. Tons of nixies from 1960's, some from 1970's. Mine tested-out fine, no signs of darkening, no blue dots, etc. Definitely new-in-box, but questionable if they were actually manufactured in 1985.

Chuck - The lot of 6 was 100 USD thru buy-it-now. I saw some on auction; I dont see these very often so I got greedy and snagged them for spares. My big clock uses 15 of them, and after almost 4 years I've had 1 failure plus 2 that are showing some signs of wear (1 is darkening, 1 is getting dimmer).

[Nicholas Stock]

There's been a few sales of these from Electrosurplus on Ebay also, they range around the 100 dollar mark for 6 all the way up to 180 for 6. They're nice tubes.

On Fri, May 5, 2017 at 8:42 AM, gregebert <greg...@hotmail.com> wrote:

Terry- I wouldn't be surprised if they were re-dated. 1985 seemed too recent, as LEDs & VFDs were churned-out like jelly beans at that time. Tons of nixies from 1960's, some from 1970's. Mine tested-out fine, no signs of darkening, no blue dots, etc. Definitely new-in-box, but questionable if they were actually manufactured in 1985.

Chuck - The lot of 6 was 100 USD thru buy-it-now. I saw some on auction; I dont see these very often so I got greedy and snagged them for spares. My big clock uses 15 of them, and after almost 4 years I've had 1 failure plus 2 that are showing some signs of wear (1 is darkening, 1 is getting dimmer).

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[Terry S]

It makes sense, they never were a manufacturer, just a re-brander. And they had to guarantee their tubes, at least as supplied to the military, So they needed a date code as a reference. The printing on the tubes looks way better than most that I've seen.

I believe Radio Shaft did the same thing on some tubes late in their game. They may have been buying from Richardson.

Terry

[threeneurons]

I used 6091s on my wall clock, a couple of years back:

https://threeneurons.wordpress.com/nixie-power-supply/my-nixie-clocks/

Nice tubes. They're holding up well, though its only been a couple of years. They were used, quite a bit, before i got my hands on them, due to some silvering on the side. Still work very well.

[Nicholas Stock]

What a splendid looking timepiece! Well done! Did you make this with your board etc that you sell?

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[gregebert]

Nice design; I'm sure you spent many, many hours on the case. The nixies almost appear to be 'wireless' in the photo. 

BTW, my google icon is a picture of my big clock. The numbers are b6091's, so you get a rough idea how big the clock is (22" across). The hands are individual NE-2H bulbs (there are 304 of them on the PCB). The case is a wooden ring similar to yours, but I had to laminate dozens of arcs as it was too big to carve from a single slab of wood.

[Charles MacDonald]

On 17-05-05 12:25 AM, gregebert wrote:

> I was surprised to see the 8522 date-code; the only other tubes I've
> encountered that were manufactured more recently are from the USSR.

A couple of years back Tim Lang managed to get a closeout of some Nixies
from Richardson/National and they were totally unmarked. I belive
Richarson bought up Very large stocks of any tubes thay would get their
hands on in "warehouse" condition mostly, and Box and Brand them
"National Electronics" when they get an order. The date code would be
applied along with the branding. They probably will also box and Brand
to the customers brand on request. (I have lots of receiving tubes made
by GE in Kentucky which are branded RCA, Amererex and other brands,
where the boxes have a KR part number, KR standing for Ken-Rad the
original owners of that factory (EIA CODE 188-5))


--
Charles MacDonald Stittsville Ontario
cm...@zeusprune.ca Just Beyond the Fringe
No Microsoft Products were used in sending this e-mail.

[chuck richards]

$16.67 per tube is not too bad actually, for a moderately
rare tube such as these 6091/8423 ones are.

Chuck

>
>
>---- Original Message ----
>From: greg...@hotmail.com
>To: neoni...@googlegroups.com
>Subject: RE: [neonixie-l] Re: Spotted on Ebay: B6091/NL8423 nixies
>(larger20mm/0.8 inch). Manufactured 1985

>Date: Fri, 5 May 2017 08:42:05 -0700 (PDT)
>
>>Terry- I wouldn't be surprised if they were re-dated. 1985 seemed
>too
>>recent, as LEDs & VFDs were churned-out like jelly beans at that
>time. Tons
>>of nixies from 1960's, some from 1970's. Mine tested-out fine, no
>signs of
>>darkening, no blue dots, etc. Definitely new-in-box, but
>questionable if
>>they were actually manufactured in 1985.
>>
>>Chuck - The lot of 6 was 100 USD thru buy-it-now. I saw some on
>auction; I
>>dont see these very often so I got greedy and snagged them for
>spares. My
>>big clock uses 15 of them, and after almost 4 years I've had 1
>failure plus
>>2 that are showing some signs of wear (1 is darkening, 1 is getting
>dimmer).
>>

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>6c426b0da0f6%40googlegroups.com.

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[Paul Andrews]

Or you could bid on this one: https://www.ebay.com/itm/112392941139

That seller has some interesting stuff.

[gregebert]

On Friday, May 5, 2017 at 3:17:53 PM UTC-7, charles wrote:

[...  I belive Richarson bought up Very large stocks of any tubes thay would get their

hands on in "warehouse" condition mostly, and Box and Brand them

"National Electronics" ...]

Does that mean NL nixie tubes were manufactured by someone else (most likely Burroughs) ?

That would certainly explain why they look and operate identically.

[Jeff Walton]

Very Nice!

 

Jeff

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[David Forbes]

I have seen no indication that National Electronics ever made anything.
They are like NTE, buying old parts and relabeling them. But National
may have paid to have batches of tubes made generically for them.

I have a bunch of National Electronics 1EP1 CRTs. They look Chinese.
When I was buying 3RP1A CRTs from them by the hundreds, they were
generic Chinese tubes in musty factory boxes, but were the same tubes
that they would label as "National Electronics" when bought
individually. Same with 5870 Nixies - National Electronics labels when
bought in small quantities, ITT labels when bought in bulk.

--
David Forbes, Tucson AZ

[Nick]

NL is National Electronics of Geneva, Illinois.

Nick

[Alic]

I just received NL-5445 tubes with '85 date code, labeled "made in USA".