"Trochotron" decade counter tube from ancient computer


(no charge for cat hair)

Images show vacuum tube centered inside molded rubber cylinder, inside cylindrical magnet, inside inside another molded rubber cylinder, inside steel tube.


Comment from Tim Richardson W4IOU: The "Unknown old computer tube" you show appears to be a Burroughs 6703 / BD-301 Trochotron or something very similar. Check out this web page:
http://www.decadecounter.com/vta/articleview.php?item=340
Comment from Chuck McGregor: I was just browsing your website when I noticed your mystery counting tube. I think it is a trochotron decade counter. Here is one reference (with many more less obtainable ones): Millman & Taub: "Pulse and Digital Circuits" (1956), section 11-8

I vaguely remember some similar tubes by Burroughs...they may have been called Beam-X tubes (or that may have been a different device.) I think they were used to implement some counters in the radar on the YF-12 interceptor aircraft around 50 years ago. http://www.decadecounter.com/vta/articleview.php?item=268


Comment from David R. Brooks: This is almost certainly a "trochotron". They are mentioned briefly on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nixie_tube See also http://www.tubecollector.org/vs10g.htm

Unlike true Nixies, the trochotron was a hard-vacuum device, so could switch much faster than a Nixie (over 1MHz).


Opcom - Indeed it might well be. These guys can't all be wrong, and they seem to agree on the class of tube! I have discovered an old military frequency/impulse counter that seems to use them, or similar. Yet to collect the YF-12 aircraft. sort of like having the doorknob and needing the house to go with it. Hope to dig that old counter out some day..

The cat and the tube