ATTENBERGER%ORN.MFENET@LLL-MFE.ARPA (03/20/86)
I have an old Heathkit TV with manual tuning, vaccuum tubes, etc. It occurs to me that it should be possible tune in the midband cable channels by patching some components into the tuner circuits. Has anybody tried it? Also my vaccuum tube supplier just went out of business. Is it going to become impossible to get vaccuum tubes someday? Does anybody have a mail-order address for tubes?
raan@hp-pcd.UUCP (raan) (03/25/86)
> Is it going to become impossible to get vaccuum tubes > someday? Does anybody have a mail-order address for tubes? My experience has been that tubes are doubling in price every year, and that the selection is getting smaller. Since the cost of making tubes can't be getting that much worse, I believe that manufacturers are deliberately trying to discourage people from repairing tube equipment by setting the tube prices artifically high. If they succeed then they will stop making tubes. Therefore, I think tubes will be increasingly difficult and expensive to replace. You can order tubes from the ROBERT E. PRIEBE company (RCA) or the ELECTRONIC SUPPLY company (Sylvania), both of Seatle, WA. Sorry, I don't have the addresses. Radio Shack also sells some tubes. Older tubes can sometimes be found by looking in the classifieds in magazines like RADIO/ELECTRONICS. --- Raan Young Unix mail: [hplabs|uoregon|orstcs|harpo|microsoft|tekronix]->!hp-pcd!raan
rees@apollo.uucp (Jim Rees) (03/29/86)
You can order tubes from the ROBERT E. PRIEBE company (RCA) or the
ELECTRONIC SUPPLY company (Sylvania), both of Seatle, WA. Sorry, I
don't have the addresses. Radio Shack also sells some tubes. Older
tubes can sometimes be found by looking in the classifieds in magazines
like RADIO/ELECTRONICS.
Why would anyone want to pay list price for a tube? List on a 6AU6 is
up around $15 now, but I can think of half a dozen places to get them
for $.50 to $3. I suspect that these bargains will be harder to find as
the years go by, and I am slowly building up a private stock.
Tubes may be getting harder to find, but remember that you can always
repair tube equipment. In ten years, if the VLSI chip in your Sony TV
goes bad, you will have 30 pounds of expensive inert matter. But 38 years
after its manufacture, my Hallicrafters TV is still repairable. And the
Zenith color set in my living room, 20 years old, will still be fixable
long after your Sampo bites the dust. Custom VLSI has ushered in the
age of the disposable TV set.