Quote:
Originally Posted by TonyDuell
Do you ever use a continuity tester? Surely that's a pass/fail indicator.
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Yes and I agree with your remarks. But a meter on a continuity check with its beeper is the most primitive of the meter's functions.
Surely in the case of a test instrument, like a valve tester, configured with multiple sockets, power supplies, metering etc, one would expect more from it than a heater continuity test, or just electrode shorts and pass -fail output.
It is actually a shame, when all the equipment required to compute and display a transconductance test result is already right there in the box in most testers, and the manufacturer chose to make a pass fail or good bad output as though the test was the result of a primitive function.
I think it was done because the testers were being used as a screening tool, intended to be operated by a person who might not be able to interpret the significance of transconductance data, so as to reject valves deemed by the tester as "duds" and throw them in the trash.
I can imagine one triode (maybe a 6J5) talking to another in the bottom of the trash can: "After I was made they found something wrong with me and threw me away like a piece of rubbish" Ignoring the fact that this triode might have been able to have a productive life in some application.