Self-introduction & tube trading

[Duncan Townsend]

Hello everybody!

I'm Duncan, an American software engineer by day and vacuum tube
enthusiast when I'm not distracted by other things. I have an unreasonable
number of pokers in the fire right now, but they include:

* a clock based on each of J.B. Dance's Electronic Counting Circuits
chapters (how low can I get the active part count without involving
silicon components?)
* tuning fork timebase for the above clocks
* 1j24b (Russian subminiature rod pentode) CPU
* 1j25r (even smaller than 1j24b) headphone amplifier

In particular, I'm interested in hearing from the experts what kind of fun
tube-based displays I might've overlooked for the 1j24b CPU. My current
plan is 5971 13-segment tubes (I'm too poor for that many 7971s), but I
don't really know what's out there.

===

I'm also interested in trading to get some of the tubes I admire for their
aesthetics. I consider the National NL-90X series (NL-900 no decimal,
NL-901 left decimal, NL-902 right decimal, NL-908 both decimals) as well
as the Ericsson GR10N tubes some of the most beautiful ever manufactured
and would love to trade for/buy some. I have a large number of enormous
ICL1-1/7 VFDs as well as some tiny National NL-4998 nixies for trade. I
also have the above mentioned sub-subminiature Russian tubes (1c38a
triode, 1c38a-q Chinese variant triode, 1j25r pentodes, and tg5r
thyratron) as well as their slightly less sub- brethren (1c1a triode,
06p1a pentode, 1t1a thyratron) for anyone who wants to build out their
collection of oddities.

--Duncan

[Michail Wilson]

Very kewl.

I'm interested in your 5971 project. 😊
A lot of work might already be done for you if you look at SmartSockets.

Michail

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[Tidak Ada]

Hello Duncan,

Interesting projects.

About those Russian rod-gridded tubes I will refer you to TCA-member [ tubecollecto...@groups.io ] Joe Sousa (MIT). He did a lot of research on these tubes. His reports are also published at Radiomuseum.org [ https://duckduckgo.com/?q=radiomuseum.org+english+language&hps=1&atb=v261-1&ia=web ]

I had plans for a clock with moving coil meter readouts, but I stopped after calculating the power consumption of the project.
Intention was to start with a TC X-tal oscillator (400kHz) then count down with dekatrons to the 0,1Hz region. Then a clock counter with a D/A converter to the meters.

Unfortunately, the power consumption is irresponsible, especially in this time of scarcity and hi prices in Europe.

Success!
eric (Tidak Ada)

-----Oorspronkelijk bericht-----
Van: neoni...@googlegroups.com [mailto:neoni...@googlegroups.com] Namens Duncan Townsend
Verzonden: zondag 21 augustus 2022 3:53
Aan: n, the eoni...@googlegroups.com
Onderwerp: [neonixie-l] Self-introduction & tube trading

[Duncan Townsend]

Thanks for the warm welcome!

Michail: part of the challenge for the 1j24b CPU is to build the whole
thing without any silicon. Building the muxing and decoding circuitry for
the 5971s without using a PIC is part of the fun! Of course, sourcing
high-voltage germanium diodes is a slog.

eric: I had read Joe's research radiomuseum.org but did not know that we
shared an _alma mater_. Thanks for the connection and the pointer to
tubecollectorsassociation! Re: quartz oscillators, how did you get the
frequency down into the dekatron range? IIRC, most dekatrons don't work
until you're down in the tens of kilohertz.

--Duncan

P.S. correction to my original email: I have a large quantity of ILC1 1/7
VFDs not ICL1 1/7.

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[Dekatron42]

Wlecome, interesting projects!

Some Dekatrons work in the 100KHz (8035) up to 1MHz (EZ10B) range, there are a few other types too - the EZ10B seems to be the one easiest to find for sale on eBay.

I was tinkering with GSA10G/GCA10G and also the Russian A-201 Polyatron to drive multi-segment Nixies like B5971 and also for multi-digit Nixies like ZM1206 but I never finished those projects properly as I got sidetracked by other more interesting things and then Covid hit me.

You might also check out Trocohotrons if you want high speed counting and Nixie driving capabilities at the same time.

/Martin

[Tidak Ada]

Hi Duncan,

I have some Elesta EZ10 A/B tubes (1MHz resp. 500kHz) that could do the job if I can get the MHz of the 4MHz TCXO at 400kHz in a 'fair' way. There must be a way using heterodyne mixing, but that goes
beyond my technical knowledge. HP used the technology in some counters in their early years.
The trouble is that the EZ10A is a hydrogen filled tube. Hydrogen diffuses through glass, so there is a good chance that the tube is dead.

Another less fair way is to use (High levl)TTL or CMOS chips there. After all, the TCXO is also a semiconductor oscillator.

The lower frequencies have to be divided by some Sylvania 6879 dekatrons.
The display part should exist by a GS12C, GS12D and GC12/4B and some 10-counters from the Ericsson house.

I am at the level to set up a test circuit for the Elesta's, but time and age are the bottlenecks.
Anyhow, I like to save some of the Elesta's for my tube collection.
Another guy who may be able to help you is Graham McGuire, also a Neonixie-L member

Cheers,
eric

-----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- Van: neoni...@googlegroups.com [mailto:neoni...@googlegroups.com] Namens Duncan Townsend

Verzonden: zondag 21 augustus 2022 17:17
Aan: neoni...@googlegroups.com
Onderwerp: RE: [neonixie-l] Self-introduction & tube trading

To view this discussion on the web, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/neonixie-l/rpsr142-3ps-9827-819r-2o4848n45p3%40qhapnapzg.pbz.

[Duncan Townsend]

Martin: I'd never heard of pandicon tubes before! That's so cool! Driving
them seems like a real pain, though, what with all the mandatory
multiplexing going on. Probably less of a pain if you're willing to use a
microcontroller? I would love to see some of your work, if you have a
link.

One of Dance's chapters is about beam switching/trochotron counting
circuits, so I'm already stealing wholesale from that to build a clock.

Eric: when I was investigating options for my tuning fork timebase, I came
across a plethora of vacuum tube quartz crystals in the low-hundreds to
tens of kilohertz range. Of course, they're pretty old and probably have
poor temperature compensation, but it would solve your frequency problem
without "cheating". I've also seen some people using astable
multivibrators as frequency dividers, but by all accounts they're fiddly
beasts.

--Duncan

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[Richard Scales]

Good morning,

I have nothing of any note to trade but would be interested in purchasing some of your large VFD's/ I am in the UK, please let me know if you would be happy to ship there and if so, what you would like to sell some for?

 - RIchard