BC550/560

[Mark Johnson]

I bought some C-grade (highest beta) BC550's and BC560's from Rochester. The price was extremely low, BUT Rochester has a $250 minimum per line-item. I swallowed hard and bought $250 worth of BC550C's and another $250 worth of BC560C's. I'm now set for a good many months.

_

 

[adason]

you should open small store

 

[adason]

start working on this one...

 

[adason]

or this one...

 

[diyralf]

start working on this one...

By inspection: horrible noisy.

 

[adason]

by name: low noise preamp...

...where is that ignore button!

 

[adason]

.

 

[Alienspecimen]

.

This is the circuit that requires the high hfe transistors. It is an old HK330C receiver

There is a malfunctioning transistor in the phono stage. I figured out that the components are at the end of life and might not be a bad idea to replace them all as I am in there...

 

[indianajo]

On Semi BC560C & BC550C are in stock at farnell UK for $.25 ea. The datasheet has the 1 and 1.4 db noise spec. newark (SC) can direct order them.

 

[dliscomb]

Update:
Both Mouser nor Digikey list BC560s as obsolete and neither has stock as far as I can tell.
Rochester has plenty, in a variety of grades, but the min buy is $250 (~2000 pcs) for the most expensive (BC560CG by OnSemi)


Anyone interesting in splitting an order with me?


Kind regards,
Drew

 

[Mark Tillotson]

Some enterprising person needs to make micro-breakout boards for a couple of BC850 or BC860's - connected with emitter resistors a pair of the SOT23's will have comparable dissipation rating and noise performance I reckon.


Farnell quote BC560 as no longer manufactured, as is the BC179, but the NPN ones (BC550's and BC109C's) are available (109C is "best seller")...

 

[Mark Johnson]

I was lucky enough to foresee this ahead of time -- and I bought 1000 of each so I'd have plenty of BC550-560 parts to mess around with, enough for the rest of my life.

I'm glad I did.

Maybe you, dear reader, might want to imagine the delisting of your favorite through hole devices ... and then immediately buy a lifetime supply now. I suspect you'll be glad you did.

 

[diyralf]

The wafer appears to have moved to India. CDIL is now producing the BC560-TO92. I can not say if the quality is right. It's a shame how the good parts disappear just because they're not SMDs.

 

[Mark Tillotson]

They haven't dissapeared, they've moved to SMT packages. BC850 = BC550, BC860 = BC560

 

[ferret]

RS Components seems to have stock somewhere.
Doesn't ZTX have any equivalent to the BC550/560?

 

[Mark Johnson]

Doesn't ZTX have any equivalent to the BC550/560?

The side-by-side comparison feature of DigiKey's "Parametric Search" may be a useful research tool for you, when you seek as-good-or-better parts from other manufacturers.

 

[JeffYoung]

Fairchild/OnSemi 2N5401s are starting to dry up too....

 

[Mark Johnson]

Fairchild/OnSemi 2N5401s are starting to dry up too....

Four hundred eleven thousand in stock at DigiKey ... in the SOT23-3 surface mount package. Draw your own conclusions.

 

[dreamth]

They haven't dissapeared, they've moved to SMT packages. BC850 = BC550, BC860 = BC560

I was just checking the Art of electronics table on Va and saw Mark's topic too. Really cool findings! Measuring the Early voltage "VA" of some PNPs at 8mA

 

[rsavas]

Fairchild/OnSemi 2N5401s are starting to dry up too....

Just bought 100 of 2N5401Y at Digi-Key. This is a hfe graded part