Strange tube ID

It sounds like a 6H6, a dual diode that was used as a detector and AVC rectifier. Two pins for the filament, two pins for each diode, and a pin to ground the shell totals seven pins.

My first thought was also the 6H6, but he mentions 7 pins. So the question is, does the socket have 8 pins available, and if so, I would back up the 6H6 suggestion.

Peter

As he said it was an octal base with 7 pins, I took that to be a standard 8 pin octal pattern, but with only 7 pins fitted, which was a common enough scheme, with sometimes as many as three pins missing.

David, the 'unused' pin on a 6H6, is pin 6, so that's the 6th pin counting clockwise from the spigot. If that's the one that you have missing, then I would go along with Michael and Peter, and say that it most likely is a 6H6. Was the paint on it originally black ?

Arfa

On 9/7/2009 5:24 PM Arfa Daily spake thus:

Yep. And yep.

I thought it would be obvious that it was an 8-pin base missing a pin by saying "octal", but I guess not.

On 9/7/2009 5:24 PM Arfa Daily spake thus:

Dang. I just measured the filament resistance (pins 2 & 7), and whaddya know: got 5.5 ohms (IOW, continuity). No shorts between other elements. This thing probably works.

I can see my eBay auction now:

"L@@K! RARE VINTAGE RADIO TUBE!"

(One site

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Wasn't there any id on the radio itself, either a sticker on the back or bottom, or something on the chassis next to the tube itself? Otherwise 6H6 seems limke a good bet. Were there any other tubes in the radio? IF so, let us know.

On 9/7/2009 9:05 PM hr(bob) snipped-for-privacy@att.net spake thus:

Yeah, there was a diagram, but I wasn't interested enough to look at it. (It was a GE, though, I remember that.) There had apparently been a dead animal of some sort in proximity to the radio.

I have a bottle-shaped 6Y6-G here in front of me from the same set. Also had a bunch of metal 6SN7s, I believe.

I assumed that he was saying it was octal with the eight pin never installed. Agreed, probalby a 6H6...

It was replaced by the 6AL5, a seven pin miniature tube.

The 6Y6 is an audio output tube, the 6SN7's were not commonly used in straight radio receivers, they are dual triodes frquently used as audio amplifiers to drive the audio output tube(s). I would have expected a 6SQ7 or 6SF7 and some tube with a metal tip for the IF ampliifier and a second similar tube, but not necessarily the same type, for the Oscillator/Mixer.