Quote:
Originally Posted by Olorin67
A mutual conductance tester will usually state so on the unit, it was a selling point. They tend to have a few more knobs than emissions testers. An emissions tester is entirely adequate if your checking used tubes to see if they have life lest. MC testers tend to be more sensitive to spotting grid issues that matter in some circuits. There were some proprietary circuits out there that were a bit in-between a true Gm test, and a plain emissions test, usually these were under some kind of trade name that included "conductance" in the title. Often these were a way around Hickock's patent.
pretty much no testers actually applied true working plate voltages to the higher power tube types, you still need to test them in a circuit as a final check.
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OK so I went back to the antique mall today and looked at the tube testers and they both had roll charts on them, the Heathkit was a Model TC-3 or something like that, the Philco was a Model 050. I took a picture of them both, and they both appeared to be emissions testers but I'm not sure as they did seem to have quite a few more knobs and switches than the emissions testers that I already have did (the Sencore Mighty-Mite and the EMC 213 that I have of which both don't have provisions for the older 4-7 pin tubes like the ones I saw at the antique mall did.)
Maybe now that we have model numbers and some pictures maybe someone can tell me what they are and which one would be worth popping on.
EDIT: From what I gathered from the manual I saw online for the Heathkit TC-3 Tube tester it appears that the Heathkit might be a mutual Conductance tube tester because they mention a function that the tester is capable of called "Transconductance Testing" which I figure must be Heathkit's version of Mutual Conductance testing (since "Mutual Conductance" was a Registered trademark of Hickock and couldn't be used by Heathkit.)