Re: Tubes + SCR's has no class!

[FutureT-at-aol-dot-com (by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>)]

In a message dated 9/2/00 9:44:46 PM Pacific Daylight Time, tesla-at-pupman-dot-com 
writes:

> Original poster: "Area31 Research Facility" <rwstephens-at-hurontario-dot-net> 
>  
>  Tube Coilers,
>   
>  I just read..."An SCR can act as a switch to ground the cathode of the 
tube,
>  thereby turning the oscillator on.  They are the preferred device for doing
>  this" ?!!!!  Sure this might work but it surely is sacrilegious no?
>   
>  Wouldn't it be 'more proper' to keep it all half a century old technology 
> and
>  all tubes by going to a mercury or gas thyratron tube between the 
oscillator
>  tube cathode and the system ground. Forget the modern SCR. If you think an 
> 833A
>  looks more macho than a cold bank of power mosfets, you're gonna absolutely
>  love a big thyratron tube plugged in next to it!
>   
>  I've experimented along this vein and found the mercury thyratron to be
>  extremely easy to implement and trigger, not to mention indestructible.
>  You don't need a large one either.  One smaller one I tried was the same
>  envelope size and shape as an 807 and worked well on the bottom of four 
811A'

Robert,

LOL,  True, you can't beat the thyratron for it's old technology "look".
I've tried one too on my 38" spark tube TC and it works great.  It's
fun seeing the thryratron's blue flash pulse in sync with the sparks.
The two things I don't like about the thyratron are the oven heat-up
time of 5 minutes + or so, and the need for another filament xfrmer.
These are especially troublesome for a portable coil.

The SCR worked great on the coil with a minimum of fuss.

John Freau

---
> s.
>   
>  Robert W."You can have my tubes when you can pry them from my cold dead
>  fingers" Stephens