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Re: [TCML] Handmade Vacuum Tubes Video: Build A Better 811A Mousetrap?



Ed Phillips wrote:

You can buy the getters."

Where can one buy getters and also thoriated tungsten wire [like #40, not welding rod]? I have a smallunopened tin of "Batalum" [sp?] getters which a technician of mine gave me almost 60 years ago. He'd worked at Raytheon and had picked up a few souvenirs there.



I would check the vacuum supply places like Duniway, for rebuild kits for ion gages and so forth. There are firms that sell things for physicists building ion guns and the like, too. They are an obscure thing, and might have non-hobby sized minimum buys, but I'm pretty sure that places that, for instance, make TWTs don't make their own getters. They buy them somewhere (Acme Getter Company, or something.. there's probably 1 or 2 places in the world that actually make them).

They also use getters in vacuum insulation systems. Lots of solar collectors these days use vacuum insulation on the liquid pipes, and they're gettered.

A quick google shows, for instance, http://www.alvatec.com, http://www.saesgetters.com

Replacement elements for a Titanium Sublimation pump might be another source..

For thoriated tungsten... ooohh.. that's going to be a tough one. I'll bet each tube company had someone who did it in house, because it's a tricky thing, and trace components affect the performance. In a TWT with an indirectly heated cathode, there's a little sintered puck of stuff, including the thoria and other secret ingredients.

THat one you might have to make yourself..
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