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Please advice. Just bought few Chinese made Valve Art EL156 (octal
base).-

The EL156 appears to be a rather high powered TV Horizontal Sweep
tube.
But the specs given on the data sheet while in PP pentode operation
look
quite good. The same in PP Triode mode.-

It is most certainly not a sweep tube: it was developed specifically
for audio applications and in particular the Neumann cutting lathe
head amplifiers. It has an unusual ten pin base.

An "octal EL156" is a ******* tube and an unnecessary one since the
correct socket can be had for a few dollars.

Still make a damn good sweep tube, just as the 807 & 6L6 did in the
early daze of analogue TV. And safer for HV operation on that strange
base than on octal.

However, unlike most sweep tubes the mug1g2 is high at 15 like the EL34.
So doesn't need much signal to drive it to full power.

WOULD it make a good sweep tube? I dunno. To come to that conclusion
we would need to build a tube TV around it. Not much of that going on
anymore.

Although....I've heard a lot of sea stories about the superb contrast
and detail some homebrew monochrome sets in the 50s obtained by
determined hot rodder builders. Most of them used mercury or xenon
vapor HV rectified EHV from scope-like HV supplies, deadly if one
weren't careless, and big round military CRTs. And tuners salvaged
from the earliest postwar TVs.


Would I build an amp with EL156? Not too likely. I like things that may
still be available down the line a bit. But all looks interesting just
the same.

They're still cutting vinyl with those amps so the supply may
continue.