Circuit diagram for the Russian A-201 polyatron?

[Dekatron42]

Hi All,

 

Does anyone have a circuit diagram for the Russian Polyatron A-201 that they could share with me - I have the datasheet (a few different versions) and also some information from other books but nothing that shows an actual circuit with the A-201 in it. I can get it to work with whats in the datasheets but i would like to find an instrument or a true application that actually used them

 

/Martin

[marcin]

Hi Martin,
it seems we are exactly at the same point. I have the original Russian datasheet, a simple drawing showing A-201 connection found on a Russian forum and that is all. I have looked through Russian web sites and did not find any mention about any A-201 usage. But that is often true for many Russian valves. Well it is similar when I try to find datasheet for a US Army/Navy/Air CTRs...
What I want to do is a clock (of course) with IN-18 being driven by A-201s. The A-201 are supposed to be cascaded using cold cathode thyratrons. Kind of 'all tube' clock. My problem right now is that I am a happy owner of a single A-201. So, cant do any experiments with cascading. For the clock I of course need 6 of them, so I still need 5! Anybody would like part with their A-201? I offer money or Polish nixies including many special character types. Gosh Martin, now I see I have stolen your thread. I am sorry!!!
Cheers!
Marcin

[Dekatron42]

Hi Marcin,

 

No problem hijacking the thread as long as it stays on focus. ;) You don't happen to know anyone who can translate the Russian datasheets into English? Using Google translate takes a long time......

 

Have you looked at page 151-152 in "Electronic counting circuits" by J.B. dance? There you can find a very simple circuit showing how the output signal is taken from a Polyatron/Nixie circuit.

 

The voltage level of the output pulse depends on the bias voltage the biasing network with resistors connected betwen the Polyatron and the Nixie to the H.T line sets, and also if the the resistor in the Anode/Cathode circuit is placed at the Cathode of the Polyatron or in the Anode of the Nixie, the voltage base level depends on the current flowing through the resistor and its value. You just need to couple that pulse through a capacitor and a voltage divider to a transistor or to a tube, just remember that it is a positive pulse if you use a tube and also use a coupling circuit that doesn't load the Polyatron/Nixie circuit as it will otherwise not work correctly. The output pulse drops from the bias voltage to the voltage across the Polyatron and Cathode resistor,  but if the resistor is placed at the Anode of the Nixie just to the voltage across the Polyatron.

 

/Martin

[Jon D.]

I am also interested in an A-201 circuit diagram.  Any idea where to find the Electronic Counting Tubes by J.B. Dance reference.  So far a google search hasn't turned up anything for me.

[Dekatron42]

Hi Jon,

 

I do not have any reference to the J.B. Dance book but I have included the relevant pages as one small document.

 

/Martin

[Jon D.]

Thank you, Martin.

Jon

[Marcin]

I use google plus several years of my primary education. I was taught
Russian in the school. Hardly remember anything now. I am attaching
pages I have (in Russian but with a poor OCR).
Thanks for the info on coupling. I will start playing with regular
dekatrons to get filling about it.
Marcin

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[JohnK]

I am keen to get an OCR for Russian [to scan a book on avionics and
aircraft instruments and translate it]
Any tips appreciated.
John K.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Marcin" <marcin.r...@gmail.com>
To: <neoni...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 17, 2013 2:15 AM
Subject: Re: [neonixie-l] Re: Circuit diagram for the Russian A-201
polyatron?


>I use google plus several years of my primary education. I was taught
> Russian in the school. Hardly remember anything now. I am attaching
> pages I have (in Russian but with a poor OCR).

...clip....

[Konstantin]

Hi John,
I used a few old versions of Finereader from Abbyy:
http://finereader.abbyy.com/professional/

Konstantin
www.kosbo.com

-----Original Message-----
From: neoni...@googlegroups.com [mailto:neoni...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of JohnK
Sent: Saturday, February 16, 2013 3:56 PM
To: neoni...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [neonixie-l] Re: Circuit diagram for the Russian A-201
polyatron?

I am keen to get an OCR for Russian [to scan a book on avionics and
aircraft instruments and translate it] Any tips appreciated.
John K.


----- Original Message -----
From: "Marcin" <marcin.r...@gmail.com>
To: <neoni...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 17, 2013 2:15 AM
Subject: Re: [neonixie-l] Re: Circuit diagram for the Russian A-201
polyatron?


>I use google plus several years of my primary education. I was taught
> Russian in the school. Hardly remember anything now. I am attaching
> pages I have (in Russian but with a poor OCR).
...clip....

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[Dekatron42]

Hi Marcin,

 

Thank you fo rthe Russian data, I had not seen the first page nor the last page before.

 

Did you do any translation of those pages?

 

/Martin

[Marcin Adamski]

No, I don't. But if you want it I will translate, my Russian is good
enough. And I have a Russian colleague temporary working with me.
Marcin

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[Dekatron42]

Hi Marcin,

 

It would be very kind of you if you could have them translated and if possible add a small dictionary with the most common words used, then I can probably read and understand other datasheets a little bit more easily in the future.

 

I've added one more A201 page that I got from Jon here at the forum a few days back, can you have a go at translating that one too please?

 

/Martin

[Marcin Adamski]

Can be done. Will try tomorrow (Sunday) but can't promise.
Marcin

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[Jon]

 

The most curious thing about the A201 is pin 9, whose function translates as 'screen' or 'shield'. It's not shown in use on any circuit diagram I've seen for this tube.

 

The only other counting tube I'm aware of with such a structure is the G10/241E Nomotron (and of course the 11TU7 lookalike). The datasheet for that also does not discuss the function, but specifies that it be set at a +90V bias. J B Dance (Electronic Counting Circuits) suggests that the purpose of the shield is to confine the glow to the required part of the tube. It could well be a similar function for the A201. In the polyatron configuration, unlike the dekatron, the discharge glow is associated with the common electrode rather than the electrode which is spatially specific for each counting position. This may mean that additional measures like the shield are required to stop the glow spreading across the common cathode and degrading the counting performance.

 

It's interesting that Marcin's datasheet says that the glow is purple, whereas every A201 I've ever seen is neon-orange...

 

Jon.

 

[Dekatron42]

Hi Marcon,

 

I am in no hurry so please take all the time you need.

 

/Martin

[Dekatron42]

Hi Jon,

 

Patent CA575269 mentions the G10/241E and also some on the "screen" electrode and its workings. i have not dug deeper into the inner workings, just accepted that the "screen" electrode helps in forming the electron path and enhances the process of stepping the tube.

 

/Martin

[Dekatron42]

Whoops, forgot to include the patent so here it is.

 

/Martin

[Jon]

Thanks Martin - hadn't seen this one. Interesting that this patent sets out a different connection of the shield electrode in order to increase performance of the tube.

 

Jon.

[AnubisTTP]

I have read in multiple places that the screen electrode in the A201 is to prevent fouling of the anodes with sputter material from the cathodes.

Regards
Richard Kline

[Marcin]

On one Russian forum, sorry didn't save the source, one guy claimed the
screen function is to quickly blank the connected nixie.
Marcin

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[Jon]

Thanks Richard. Can you point us to one of those sources? Hopefully one of them might have more useful commentary about the tube also.

 

Cheers,

 

Jon.

[Dekatron42]

Hi Jon,

 

There are a whole bunch of patents for the early dekatrons with a similar electrode structure like the G10/241E and most of them talks about how to "improve" the previous design. They experimented a lot with different kinds of "extra" electrodes and bias voltages but mostly they could not explain how or why they "improved" the dekatrons - but that was obviously allowed in the patent as they could proove that it was an improvement.

 

When I was searching for Ericsson Dekatron patentes I skipped most of these other patents as I was not interrested in these details then and I thought I would never get my hands on a Polyatron since they are quite rare. Most of those patents talked about all the things mentioned here in this thread - stop sputter from destroying electrodes, increase the speed of which the glow could be transferred (which at the same time means that you extinguish the previous electrode faster too) by making a small current flow in a preferable direction towards the next electrode, making the surrounding component use (mostly for cathodes, not so much for the driving stages) cheaper and simpler.

 

I guess that the "screen" or "shield" electrode can have several uses at the same time and some of them might have been discovered accidentally while the designers where looking to improve something else. Some of how it can be used also depends on where it is placed between the electrodes and if it is used in a uni-directional or bi-directional Dekatron, if it is uniform or formed in a way to promote electron flow in a defined direction or not.

 

Reading old patents and magazines is fascinating but takes up so much time unfortunately. I know that J.B. Dance wrote several short articles in a few brittish magazines which explained a lot about clod cathode tubes and Dekatrons but I've unfortunately never found any good reference to use to look those up, that might be a good source of more information.

 

/Martin

[Marcin Adamski]

Hi Martin
here is translation of the page from Jon. First original with Russian
OCR, then my very, very crude translation. The other pages will follow
soonish.
Konstantin, thanks for the hint about Finereader. It does excellent job
with Russian OCR!

Marcin

On 16/Feb/13 23:01, Dekatron42 wrote:

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[Dekatron42]

Hi Marcin,

 

Excellent! Thank you for the translation!

 

/Martin

[Dekatron42]

Hi Marcin,

 

I actually found one source which confirms the use of the screen (grid or trigger electrode) in multiple-anode cold cathode tubes for just that purpose! The article is named "A study of coding with multiple-anode  glow discharge tubes" and was published in The Radio and Electronic Engineer September 1964: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5266726&url=http%3A%2F%2Fieeexplore.ieee.org%2Fiel5%2F5266378%2F5266723%2F05266726.pdf%3Farnumber%3D5266726.

 

Note that the article does not speak about counting tubes, just trigger tubes with multiple-anodes. The article is written by H.E. Seifert which also wrote an article on the glow-thyratron, the Cerberus GT21 (also Mullard Z865W) which is used together with the GCA10G/GSA10G /Z572S/Z573C) as coupling tubes.

 

There they show a way of using multiple-anode trigger tubes to do coding/decoding of signals where the anodes from more than one trigger tube is connected together and the screen/grid electrode from each tube is used to do the coding/decoding by switching on the requird trigger tubes as needed. The trigger tubes and Nixie are driven by half wave rectified AC voltage which means that the trigger tubes switches off when there is no voltage across them and the Nixie, they would have stayed on if they were driven by DC voltage until the DC voltage had been removed.

 

The article ends with a picture showing a combined tube which involves both the trigger tubes and the indicator part, which looks like a 7-segment display! I know I have seen a patent with that type of tube but I can't find it right now.

 

Last summer I wrote about two patents covering combined units with Nixie displays and a control unit which was either a Dekatron (the German patent) or a set of trigger tubes (the French patent by Elesta) here: https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!searchin/neonixie-l/combined$20dekatron/neonixie-l/VScgxdUDZ6E/IfvX3761DhoJ , looking at the French patent it is using a grid to control the electrode structure to allow different figures to be display. I haven't checked the English translation of this patent fully but what I checked talks about a design that uses a trigger tube with control electrodes - grids.

 

I'm not sure if all of this is applicable to the A-201, but it is fascinating nonetheless!

 

/Martin