12SX7 coin base tubes? Fake?

[dgta]

I just saw some tubes labelled JAN12SX7 that are coin base with green silkscreening, nothing etched in the glass. Are they fake? I've never seen a coin base 12SX7. Supposedly GE from the 1970s. Has anyone seen anything like that?

[kevinkr]

How about some pictures?

[the_manta]

There are some very rare coin base variations of tubes. I don't think anyone would fake a standard 12SX7. Just some rare late production.
There are more coin base types of tubes as you would think. Just look here. For years now I tried to get just one of them but never ever had the luck to get one.

[dgta]

Sorry Kevin, no pics. I'll get some next time I see him.

[kevinkr]

Cool, that will help. They could be real or fake, although I am not aware of anyone currently building tubes on coin bases, but that does not make it so.. I suspect they are probably just very late production.

Coin base Sylvanias and GE/RCA types are quite common around here, and are generally very very late production articles - for this reason they are often avoided by the cognoscenti because the allegation was that production quality was starting to lapse. Sort of marks a line in the sand for late North American tube production. Most, not all of the 6EM7 I have on hand are coin base, but for me that is about it, and they have all worked fine.

[dgta]

I wasn't necessarily thinking "fake" as in recently manufactured. I was thinking along the lines of someone taking old Russian tubes and silkscreening new and wonderful labels on them