Its no wonder the ECC40 is plentiful and cheap, the makers made a mistake to
use a pinout so different to the status quo
of octal, 9&7 minis.

But what was the status quo at the time it was made? It's an old valve.

Then there was noval, for 7868, etc.Why would anyone use 7868 now?

Good sound - I have some!

Maybe if they made a new version with an octal socket..

7591 - very nice.

yes, but why oh why was the noval socket ever made?!

It's Novar, isn't it? Good question.

Loctal was also brought in for milspec gear to prevent tubes falling out of
sockets.

And if you don't twist back the flange underneath the sockets are very good for
pulling the tubes to pieces trying to extract them. Nevertheless, I have some
stunning loctal tubes: C3M, 7AF7, 7N7, XXL, CV391 - these are nearly as good as
it gets in their particular types.
The whole deal with these oddball sockets is that though they are hopeless for
commercial gear as you say, they are well priced for experimenters and DIY
projects. Look at the difference in price between a '40s 7N7 and a '40s 6SN7 -
try buying the 6SN7 for $5. And to make things even better, I got 100 teflon
loctal sockets for peanuts. Try getting a teflon octal socket for $5 even!



=== Andy Evans ===
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