Fantasy tube
Could be done, but nobody would buy 'em. Everybody's already
got guitar amps; nobody has a personal MIG fighter plane; like
that. But, Arf!
Never know, if one of the big amp companies could get Guitar Player to
convince people it's a good idea, and then get some big names behind the amp
line, they could sell some. There's no shortage of baby boomers who want to
play the blues. All the same, I agree, it's likely cheaper to stick with
what's already there. Plus, I admit, it's kind of a boring fantasy tube,
because it dosen't really improve on anything, just re-package it, and
possibly make it cheaper, although less flexible.
Transconductance is the natural enemy of cathode poisoning. These
tend to devolve into issues of material purity - not a good subject
to broach "in these days of modern times". Vacuum valve manufacture
is no less complex now than it was in the Kennedy era; the difference
now is that nobody cares.
Yes, but that's what makes it a fantasy tube... it dosen't break any laws of
physics, but similar to other fantasies, such as having a fulfilling
marriage to a supermodel, it's not meant to be. All the same, tubes like
8417 and 7591A came close, and if developed further, could result in
something. For example, could frame grid technology a la 6DJ8 be applied to
an output tube?
That's a Russian type 6336. Get 'em while they're hot. No magic of
design can do more than that within design constraints.
I think the 6336 is a US tube - a super regulator dual triode which looks
like a KT88 - you mean the 6C33 or whatever it's called. I saw some of those
recently - really impressive and strange looking beasts! All the same, they
were not originally designed as OTL output tubes, and I'm sure they could be
improved upon if it was an application specific design, from the ground up.
My guess is if you gave a several million dollar grant to say, atma-sphere,
and, say, JJ, or svetlana to work together to come up with the ultimate OTL
tube, something better than the 6C33 or 6AS7 would result.
Stranger than fiction, something like this might actually happen. Hot
cathode emission has only been used in easily-visible-size valves to
date, but maybe that's just a failure of imagination (and
manufacturing capability, a temporary thing).
I wonder if there really is a technical reason for this. Is there a physical
limit to how small a hot cathode tube can be, and still work? I am sure
there would be huge challenges to overcome, but if solved, it could be
interesting.
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