Why I won't ever attempt to have a transmitting tube shipped again.

[k4kyv]

HF-300 arrived like this via Fedex.

[N3DRB The Derb]

[AF9J]

Yeesh!!

73,
Ellen - AF9J

[WA1GFZ]

SLK Express is the best way to ship tubes.

[The Slab Bacon]

SLK Express is the best way to ship tubes.

Ah, yes, nothing like the good old AM Pony Express!! Those poor 4x1s had enough miles on them that I had to get them an oil change!! However, they did arrive intact and undamaged.

                                                        The Slab Bacon

[k4kyv]

I have had tubes arrive undamaged.  They were double boxed, with the box containing the tubes several times larger than the tubes themselves, and the empty space filled with LARGE bubble wrap or those little individual plastic air cushions used for shipping, and with the space between the two  boxes also filled with bubble wrap or air cushions.

Perhaps the best way would be the method Eimac used to package 250TH's and 450T's in the WW2 era, with a metal frame inside the box and the tube suspended with an array of springs.  I once had several of those and should never have thrown them away.

This tube was packed using styrofoam sheets and "peanuts".  That stuff just isn't resilient enough to absorb the shock.  But the real problem is the way all the carriers abuse the merchandise they are being paid to transport.

Three of the last four HF-300's that I have attempted to have shipped here were ruined in transit, and the one that did make it in one piece wouldn't make positive modulation peaks beyond about 65% even though it would make full carrier power.

I give up.  I have a spare set of good ones and a large collection of marginal ones, so I'll just make do with those unless I can hand-carry a new one home myself.

To paraphrase the commonly heard expression, if we could send a man to the moon and get him back in one piece 40 years ago, why can't we transport a fragile object across the country one way, to-day?

[WA1GFZ]

Don,
You should insure them for big money so when they are damaged you can sock it to them.

[k4kyv]

Well, I'd do that if I were sending them.  But those who send stuff to me don't always want to spend the extra  cash or go to the extra trouble.  Even if the parcel is insured, you can count on it being a hassle to collect damages.

Whenever I receive a parcel, I take out my digital camera and photograph the box just as it arrived, and then photograph each step of the procedure as I unpack it, and finally photograph any visible damage to the contents.  That way, I at least have documentation if the shipper tries to say it wasn't packed properly (and in many cases it isn't).

[Tom WA3KLR]

And it's not even the holiday season.

Kinda hard to damage FETs in shipment.

[WBear2GCR]

My understanding is that used thoriated tungsten filaments become substantially brittle after they've been run a while.

Many years ago now, one fellow in my audio club (it's like a ham radio club but usually more fun...   ) made a deal with another fellow over a batch of 845 tubes. He put them in his car, in the back seat, in a box. He didn't pay for them. He drove a while... When they got out of his car it was found that the filaments no longer were continuous at all!

Accusations of fraud and conspiracy flew back and forth...

Doesn't take much on some tubes to crack the filaments.

So it may not be the carriers so much as the nature of old filaments?
No doubt the old Eimac cage with the elastic stuff is a good bet...

         _-_-Watt Battery Two Grid Cathode Rectifier

[Opcom]

I use fedex because it is convenient. Fedex does not offer insurance. There does not seem to be any convenient method of insurance.

[ka3zlr]

yeaa but none of this is any answer for careless production..

[WBear2GCR]

I use fedex because it is convenient. Fedex does not offer insurance. There does not seem to be any convenient method of insurance.

Sure they offer insurance. They may call it something else now, but if it comes broken and they can't make the case for "insufficient packaging" they pay off...

         _-_-bear

[WA1GFZ]

I know there was a time during WW2 that the alloy for tube heaters lacked an element making them prone to mechanical damage.
Most old buzzards break easier.

[c. mac neill w8znx]

i had a pair of 75TH did not survive
100 miles of good road
packed in a box full of peanuts
sitting on the passenger seat of my volvo

some tubes can not take any handling
without having the fil let go

mac