WE is like RCA*: A memory. The actual Western Electric being desolved in the 1980's... WE will make 12AX7 because money talks. They would be foolish not to. Even though 12AX7 is crap compared to 6N2P IMHO.
*RCA and GE brands are tm of Thomson now, right?
** growing up in the 80's/90's, RCA meant Renowned Crap Association... But Sarnoff was gone by then...
To be honest, I have no memory of Western Electric as a manufacture and haven't ever used any of their vintage tubes. I'm just excited that someone in the US is making something.
So far it seems that it isn't quite like all the past instances when a company that fades license its known name to someone so they can slap it on cheap junk with the hope that people will buy it based on what they thought of that company. I don't have any first hand experience with their 300Bs but I also haven't heard anything bad about them (aside from the price).
My experience with Western Electric was through Northern Electric. Telephones, not tubes 🙂
If I win the 70$M jackpot tomorrow, I'll build a tube factory in Canada.
If I win the 70$M jackpot tomorrow, I'll build a tube factory in Canada.
Tapping the "strategic stockpile"
Maybe someone knows a contact who could search the DOD dusty warehouse stockpiles for some obsolete tubes suitable for audio. Free up some storage space for them. And stick a finger in Herr Putlers eye with -cheaper- tubes now.
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Most any University Lab is going to have a glass-blower on payroll for making specialized lab equipment. Maybe can get some Moon-lighting activity started.
Probably will need a source of 9 pin button bases for them to work with.
And then there are those family Artistic glass blowing shops around. Maybe could get them involved with some part of the work.
Maybe someone knows a contact who could search the DOD dusty warehouse stockpiles for some obsolete tubes suitable for audio. Free up some storage space for them. And stick a finger in Herr Putlers eye with -cheaper- tubes now.
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Most any University Lab is going to have a glass-blower on payroll for making specialized lab equipment. Maybe can get some Moon-lighting activity started.
Probably will need a source of 9 pin button bases for them to work with.
And then there are those family Artistic glass blowing shops around. Maybe could get them involved with some part of the work.
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Out mothers made our tubes. The fine dexterity and patience of women doing all those manual steps! I remember my mom worked for Sunbeam winding motor armatures for appliances. She also worked at National Video doing something with picture tubes. Both companies in Chicago. Her crew were all ladies, tight friends, chit chatted all day. The work seems very therapeutic, maybe tedious too, but it is definitely a skill one needs to learn like an instrument, whatever your station is in the line. I kinda see my mom here in these women.
Good luck trying to get all those skilled workers back again. The Sylvania 6JK6 datasheet says it was built on an automated assembly line.
https://frank.pocnet.net/sheets/201/6/6JK6.pdf
Now, where did that assembly line go? The dump? National?
It could probably be modded or studied today to build a large range of tubes.
https://frank.pocnet.net/sheets/201/6/6JK6.pdf
Now, where did that assembly line go? The dump? National?
It could probably be modded or studied today to build a large range of tubes.
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I have a grandmother in-law (now deceased) who worked at KenRad for a bit. She saw my push pull 811a amp with 12ax7, 6sn7 drivers and said I made those and those.
Making good tubes takes mental skills more likely found in the female human.
Here's the real Western Electric. (Guy on left.)
Bell "never" took 2-page color ads. (Bell system bought one-page B&W or spot-color ads.) WE was normally even more modest. Long Lines was a very low-profile (but often high-profit) division. The Operation Companies (Illinois Bell) never bought national ink. The ESS was a Really Big Deal. And in a sense, this is why the transistor was invented/developed.
Note dial-phone.
Some great reading material engineering wise is A History Of Engineering And Science In The Bell System. The later volumes really go into details on components and print the original notebook pages from the first transistor experiments. They talk about the tubes manufactured for underwater transatlantic cables and how they designed for a 20 year lifespan. The first tube to burn out lasted 22 years!
Before I was born my mother worked for Westinghouse in Newark, NJ in the meter division making and testing panel meter movements. Then when she became a housewife and I worked in a machine shop she gave me her Starrett one inch micrometer which she used there. I still have and cherish it and it's still as good as it was eighty plus years ago. Her name was engraved on it in case anyone borrowed it.
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Any business operation should pay its way.
In the USA, that means a gross profit of $10 million a year, for a setup with many employees.
Tubes go for about $5 each wholesale, so you are looking at selling 200k tubes a year, to have sales of a million a year.
I don't think it is viable.
In the USA, that means a gross profit of $10 million a year, for a setup with many employees.
Tubes go for about $5 each wholesale, so you are looking at selling 200k tubes a year, to have sales of a million a year.
I don't think it is viable.
I say go for it too.
But other than dinosaurs like WE, extinct in all but name, the entire metallurgical industry that support valve manufacture with metals/alloys/oxides and compounds, are also, extinct (or may as well be so)
Good luck finding base materials of the same quality as "back in the older days"
My, uneducated, guess is that they won't try to compete price wise with countries with much cheaper and even free labor. If they can sell ones like KT88 and 6L6GC for around what NOS ones go for then their individual profit would be much higher.
If they can make good quality tubes for that price I'd definitely buy them over buying questionable quality NOS ones online or cheaper new ones from sources that I have ethical questions about.
If they can make good quality tubes for that price I'd definitely buy them over buying questionable quality NOS ones online or cheaper new ones from sources that I have ethical questions about.
How many will us all buy?
You are looking at a five year production of nearly one million amplifiers' worth of tubes.
To be made from new using people with no prior knowledge of the intricacies involved.
I am very dubious.
You are looking at a five year production of nearly one million amplifiers' worth of tubes.
To be made from new using people with no prior knowledge of the intricacies involved.
I am very dubious.
That's the key for a limited market.
NO large # of employees. An automated assembly line like Sylvania developed is essential for a startup with a limited # of employees. Then eventually modding it to make a wider range of tubes.
So WHERE did Sylvania's automated assembly line end up? The KEY is Sylvania, not the old WE.
I filled out the survey form again so I could suggest they also make Nixie tubes. Now they could corner the guitar player, audiophile AND clock maker markets! I agree with NareshBrd the business model just doesn't add up. Maybe a "made to order" business model, (similar to buying custom OPT's), where they don't make something unless they have a certain number of orders first. But that would require developing even more automation.
It is hard to guess at all that without knowing how many employees they will need and what their overall overhead is. I can't imagine there being one single dollar amount for all manufacturing. It is expenses vs income and expenses can vary a lot.
How could they possibly be making that much with the 300B tubes they are currently making? Yet they are still in business. As long as they scale up slowly they just have to be able to sell numbers that pay the bills and allow for a little reinvestment. It may not make the tubes affordable to everyone but never underestimate what the high end market will pay.
I'm guessing it will be a lot more likely for them to add to their line if most of the people submit the form saying they want the same tubes. If they get thousands of responses with long lists and a huge variety of tubes mentioned on each then, I'd assume, that would weigh heavily into their decision.
As others have mentioned if they can link up with the higher end amp manufactures and get enough sales of tubes to them, then they can just run extras and sell them to us little guys.
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The experts on how to make things go right in a tube factory are gonna be kinda hard to talk to, unless you have a Ouija board or a crystal ball or something.
That will be the challenge - the old patents and a lot of old design material will still exist, but all that institutional knowledge and experience is long gone. All the "tips and tricks" stuff is probably gone. Things will go wrong in the plant and it'll take a lot of time to figure out why.
That said, it's not like that stuff isn't all solvable. It just has to be worth the expense. It would not have been possible to open a new tube plant until fairly recently - there was no competing with cheap, plentiful NOS ones. Now that those are rare and expensive, and Russian production is being hampered by sanctions and tariffs, there may finally be room in the market.
That will be the challenge - the old patents and a lot of old design material will still exist, but all that institutional knowledge and experience is long gone. All the "tips and tricks" stuff is probably gone. Things will go wrong in the plant and it'll take a lot of time to figure out why.
That said, it's not like that stuff isn't all solvable. It just has to be worth the expense. It would not have been possible to open a new tube plant until fairly recently - there was no competing with cheap, plentiful NOS ones. Now that those are rare and expensive, and Russian production is being hampered by sanctions and tariffs, there may finally be room in the market.