By Eric Barbour

We currently get most of the new tube types,
because of accidents of the past.
Some Soviet, Czech, Yugoslav and Chinese factories
happened to be making 6L6 types and other things already.
Anything that has been recently introduced was either
paid for by a private investor (as with many Svetlana
types), or by an OEM wanting it.

The receiving-tube market was supposed to die,
according to industry analysts. So it is no longer
tracked or regarded by financial people as important.
Thus, no investment capital is available.

In my experience, large audio-tube customers
tend to fall into three categories:

1) Large and ruthless corporations, who are
simply buying whatever cheap tube they can get
and using it, because their customers keep demanding tube
equipment (their engineers and accountants would rather
make solid-state equipment anyway--it's easier to make,
more reliable, and more profitable!);

2) Specialist firms who have a genuine love for
tube technology, yet are too small and undercapitalized
to pay the considerable tooling charges. These gents usually
have no inkling of the costs of tube manufacturing, nor
do they seem to care.

3) Distributors, who have no interest in developing
"new" or smaller markets, and who only stock what their
customers (usually OEMs) are willing to buy in large quantities.

All of these firms are very conservative, and unwilling
to take a chance. For example, they don't see much demand for 6V6s,
so they buy very few 6V6s; and the only factory still making a 6V6
(Sovtek/Reflector) is not much interested in making a better version.
If annual sales are less than 10,000 pieces, the tube languishes.

The only person who can change this state of affairs is you, the end-consumer.

We suggest you also encourage your friends and dealers to buy
more amps and tubes of the types you want to preserve. Or they will
simply die out---for lack of interest. Calling or emailing a tube
manufacturer and asking them to make something (so you can buy 6
of them per year) is counterproductive and FOOLISH.

Eric Barbour
METASONIX