Ron Lawrence's "Radio Heaven"

My Tube Collection

I've been collecting tube for over 30 years, almost as long as I've been collecting radios. I started actively buying collectable tube back in the early 80s when my friend Ron Scranton

would load up his wife's Mercedes station wagon with goodies and come to Charlotte to visit and sell old radios and tube.

As much as I love collecting antique radios, I think I love tube collecting even more. One nice thing about them is that they're small, well at least most of them as small.

I'm honored to have been elected and reelected to the Board of Directors of the Tube Collectors Association.

Below are new photos of my tube collection.

These were taken on Tuesday February 28th, 2012.

I have just finished putting my display room that holds my antique radio collection and my tube collection back together after restoring the room after a fire.

I hope you enjoy your visit to Radio Heaven and my tube collection.

This is my wall mounted tube display case.

Below are close ups of these shelves.

These 5 Gold Air Line GX-201As are also part of my tube collection but they're not sitting in a glass display case, they live inside my glass cased battery set shown below.

I hope you enjoyed your visit to the Radio Heaven Tube Collection.

Please sign my Guest Book below.

Has anyone else ever seen a set of these Sylvania signs?

833

4-1000

X-Ray tube

Photo multiplier from Kodak PVAC color film analyzer

Hydrogen Thyrotron

X-Ray Tube

Laser tube

Welch Peanut

with external gird

Western Electric

215A

UV-204 from WBT's

first xmitter, 1922

CV1098 from British"Chain Home"

Early Radar system

Metal based tubes, mostly

Brass Based, a few with other metal on far right

DeForest tubes, large one left is a type 500

tramsmitting tube

Box for 892-R tube, note 201A for size comparison

892-R that came in the

box shown above, NOS

600 watt light bulb for tower beacon shown below.

RCA UV-862, 100,000 watt

water cooled transmitting tube from WBT transmitter,

Note 892-R for size comparison.

One of my favorites, VT-158

Zahl Tube, from WW2 radar.

Most of the tuning assembly is "inside" the glass tube.

Unfinished CRT bottle made by Corning glass

1980s vintage Sony

Watchman TV with

unusual flat CRT.

TCAs "Tube Collector"

special issues on historical CRTs

3GP1 still sealed in original shipping crate.

H1421P48 Hughes Aircraft

Flying Spot Scanner

from Kodak color film

analyzer

3NP4 Philips Holland

used in earlyNORELCO projection

television

Left to Right

USN 1AP5/P11 Kip Electronics

USN CVG 6DP7 ETC, Six gun radar display

Left to Right

unmarked 2" CRT

JAN 3AP1 KenRad

JAN 3BP1 North American Philips NORELCO

5BP4 RCA

CK1383A Raytheon CRT

memory tube used in early radar.

Collection of Cathode Ray Tubes, CRTs.

RCA 7DP4

Used in early Television

studio monitors

RCA 905 circa 1934

Early 7" Television Picture Tube, circa 1948.

At the AWA annual meet in Rochester this past August I was fortunate enough to be awarded the AWA's Tyne Award for tube collecting.

Below is quoted from the AWA's award web page;

"Tyne Award: is presented, in remembrance of Gerald F. J. Tyne,

(author of the book: "Saga of Vacuum Tube"), for contributions

to preserving or documenting the history of valve technology."

Receiving a copy of Tyne's book "Saga of Vacuum Tube" at my first AWA meet in 1978 as a door prize is what sparked my interest in tube collecting.

I'm glad I got started back then before most of the good tubes go too expensive for me.