18 Jun
2006
18 Jun
'06
9:04 p.m.
(Point of curiosity: In British English, when is a
tube a valve? You
fellows don't talk about "Cathode Ray Valves" do you? Is a photomultiplier
No, but there are many stories of uninformed customers telling the TV
enginere that the fault is the 'picture valve' :-)
tube a "valve"? How about a TWT?)
Hmmm. Good question. I am not sure of all cases, but we (the UK) would
talk about :
Diode valve, triode valve, tetrode valve, pentode valve, etc (up to
nonode valve), and things like 'frequency changer valve' (which is, I
think, what you'd call a 'converter tube').
But : Cathode ray tube, photomulitiplier tube, vidicon tube (and image
orthicon, iconoscope, if you go back that far), voltage stabiliser tube
(as in the gas-filled cold-cathode diode that started this thread :-)),
travelling wave tube, dekatron tube, nixie tube, trochotron tube, trigger
tube, etc
I think klystrons and magnetrons are more commonly 'valves' over here,
but 'tube' wouldn't sound too odd either.
Other terms change too. What you'd call a 'damper tube' in a TV
horizontal output stage, we'd call a 'booster diode (valve)' in a 'line
output stage'.
If anyone wants to know what I'd call a specific device, just ask.
-tony