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A detailed teardown and live demonstration of a TR-3 vacuum-tube trigger/flip-flop module from IBM's 1948 Electronic Calculating Punch, explaining its circuitry and historical significance.
This article describes techniques for creating glass-to-metal seals for homemade vacuum tubes, explaining the challenges of thermal expansion mismatch and how to electroplate copper onto steel wire to improve bonding.
The article discusses powering up a thyratron tube module from the 1948 IBM 604 Electronic Calculating Punch, detailing the historical context of early electronic computing and the innovation of pluggable modules.
The article explores the surprisingly enduring legacy of vacuum tube technology, detailing its historical origins and continued use in applications like high-power radio transmitters, microwave ovens, and CRT displays, despite the dominance of semiconductors.