Re: High Voltage Components from microwave ovens

From: Dave Platt (dplatt_at_radagast.org)
Date: 06/25/04 

Date: Fri, 25 Jun 2004 23:28:12 -0000

>Just curious: Do people still build linears with tubes and HV supplies
>or is it much cheaper now to use transistors? Mine were all tubes but
>that was about 20 some years ago when FETs and BJT were just way out
>there in terms of cost.

As one example: Ameritron builds solid-state ham-band amplifiers of up
to 600 watts output (their "ALS" series). Starting at the 600-watt
point, and going up to the 1500-watt legal limit, Armitron's amps are
all based on tubes. There are legal-limit HF amps which use only a
single tube (e.g. a 3CX1500A/8877 triode, running at about 2500 volts)

According to a talk I saw recently, commercial television broadcasters
have moved almost exclusively to solid-state RF amplifiers for their
newer stations. No one set of transistors can provide thenecessary
power, so the amps use a large number of smaller modular amplifiers
operating in parallel - I think the basic "brick" we were shown was
capable of a couple of hundred watts. I haven't seen any ham-band
amplifiers using this modules-in-parallel approach, although I'm
sure one could be built. 

-- 
Dave Platt <dplatt@radagast.org>                                   AE6EO
Hosting the Jade Warrior home page: http://www.radagast.org/jade-warrior
  I do _not_ wish to receive unsolicited commercial email, and I will
     boycott any company which has the gall to send me such ads!

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Class D! OT but interesting
    ... Class-D amplifiers - that's solid state switchers for the uninitiated. ... I'll stick to tubes for the fun, ... Ci Audio also makes little 100W mono amps in 6 inch sided cubes with no ...
    (rec.audio.tubes)
  • Re: Valves versus semiconductor
    ... It' s pretty much what everyone has said and more, Valves (tubes) ... when used as musical amplifiers are considered desirable because of ... the soft overload characteristics they have. ... SS amps on the other hand clip quite ...
    (rec.audio.pro)
  • Re: Tube Audio Amp question
    ... and I used the output transformers ... I ran these tubes to their limits by running ... design some tube amplifiers again. ... than semiconductor amps. ...
    (sci.electronics.repair)
  • Re: Music Man HD-130.
    ... It takes a lot to kill the early Music Man Amplifiers ... for the task and hold up well if the circuit is not abused. ... or flashed over tube issues when they are equiped with the proper ... brand and type tubes, ...
    (rec.audio.tubes)
  • Re: Cowboys herding cats
    ... weren't servers, they were stereo amplifiers. ... Warm life-affirming sound the way God and Lee De Forest ... There's no question that LPs and tubes sound ... Better yet, an MP3 player. ...
    (rec.arts.sf.fandom)