PS: correction - I should have probably wrote "partially in-gassed" as I believe the pressure inside the tubes is less than one atmosphere (someone correct me if I'm wrong), and so unwanted oxygen/nitrogen etc. gets into the tube. Any way you slice it, the tubes gets contaminated and requires higher voltage/current to achieve full ionization of the neon/argon.
Sent from my iPhone > On Feb 19, 2017, at 12:50 AM, Manuel Azevedo <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi guys, > > I also have a strange situation. > I have two Spectrums - a little older model (3 years ago) and one bought last > year. > > On the older unit I had 6 tubes with 9003 markings (I assume March 1990, but > the order is reversed from the other tubes). Never had any problem with this > tubes. > On the newer unit I had 4 tubes with 0686 markings (I assume August 1986) and > 2 tubes 0982 (I assume August 1982 - coincidently these tubes are 3 or 4 mm > taller than all the rest). > > After running for a few months on the newer unit, I noticed on one of the > 1982 tubes, that the digit 8 was starting to fade. Looked like cathode > poisoning, but I already had a 1984 tube with cathode poisoning on a Kosbo 1 > digit clock, and it didn't quite look 100% the same. > > I've replaced the tube with one of the old unit and after a few days, the > digit 8 showed again complete. > > Put the tube back into the new unit and it was OK for a few months, until on > one tube the 8 was back again losing visibility and a 0 on another tube was > starting to fade in the bottom. > > Yesterday I had enough - I replaced all the tubes between units and now all > are working OK without any "poison" symptoms. > > I've noticed that the older unit's tubes seem to shine a little bit brighter > than the newer unit. > > I guess that both units might not be delivering the same current, hence these > issues. > > Regards, > > Manuel > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "neonixie-l" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To view this discussion on the web, visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/neonixie-l/1dec2b55-291f-436b-b996-204c9da3732c%40googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "neonixie-l" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/neonixie-l/5A90C222-7EBC-4148-A0B7-E58D21341E2D%40earthlink.net. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
