He didn't live. If you haven't loved, then you haven't lived. ;-)
Yeah, when I was a kid I got my hands on old TV set chbuttis, took appart, rebuilt into other things. I played with some of the old battery filament tubes. The octal sized 1G4s, 1H4s including triodes, and the seven pin miniaturs 1U4, 1T4, etc. mostly pentodes and tetrodes. They also had sub-miniature tubes about the size of two pensil erasers. Then the nuvistors came out (about the size of one pensil erasers, but I had one but did not ever use it). Acorn tubes were also battery filament tubes and, actually, the size of a real acorn. Yeah...they were all resistant to EMP, too, and our military were laughing at the stolen Russian MIG fighters with vaccum tube radios until they realized that all of our solid state radios could be melted with an atmospheric plant burst. Then they did "hardening" which, I never found out, if it was going to do any good.
I was fortunate enough to be at the perfect
yeah... me too. Good for you. I also had a circular slide rule. And, I always wanted to get a cylindrical one (four decimal accuracy they said, 66" equivalent) and I only ever saw one in my life and they were not cheap.
I cut down trees with a stone ax to make my own
Hey, I cut down the trees here to make a driveway. electric chain saw plus five deep cycle marine batteries in series. We didn't get electricity till the house was about 90% finished.
And, there ARE tetrode transistors, too. Now, there almost ain't no transistors any more....just chips.
Oh, I can discount more if you want.
You should see how we get good deals when we buy cars. Don't tell BMJs former boss, though.
