You mentioned that Heathkit used 6146's in virtually all of their
gear. That is a valid statement, but they used 6GE5 sweep tubes in
the lower price-point HW-series monobanders, including the ones for
MARS/CAP. It was a purely a matter of economics, I think. Retail
price aside, there had to have been more manufacturing volume on the
sweep tubes, because just about every family had a TV set.

I now have a 4B-line, and also a bunch of HW-series rigs. The 6GE5's
are fairly inexpensive even today, compared to 6146A's or W's or the
later GE 6146B's that Heathikit blessed.

73,
Ted KX4OM

On Thu, 24 Mar 2005 00:37:15 GMT, "RadioGuy"
wrote:


Antonio Vernucci wrote in message
...
I don't recall the 6146 was that expensive. We could find them at the
hamfest, surplus and they were routinely given away from one ham to
another... heck,

What you say is true for a ham in need of just replacing a pair of tubes.
But it would not have been true at all for Drake.

A company producing ham gear cannot depend on tubes found at a good price
here and there. They have to place a contract with a tube manufacturer who
can guarantee delivery in time and in the required quantities. Prices are
then market prices, not surplus prices.

73

Antonio I0JX

Well, the tube (6146) was in constant production during Drakes operation
(about 30 years) so it would imply that they were very common and
cheap---practically every other amateur equipment manufacturer was using the
6146. Large numbers were used by the military and commercial services. My
gosh... if Heath was using them they certaintly couldn't have been that
prohibitive to design with. So it begs the question why Drake was using
them.

RG