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KT8

Sensibly equivalent to:
CV1079
See also:
Ceramic or Moulded Base Caps? - GEC Brand Featuring KT8
    
Extras ▼

 

The KT8 was a not very successful British attempt to emulate the American type 807. The KT8 has a moulded plastic base and the slightly different but pin compatible KT8C has a ceramic base cap.
The 807 was based on the RCA type 6L6 beam tetrode, which had a long, fairly thin, anode and a carefully-aligned grid structure. The 6L6 employed rapidly-accelerated electrons and short electron paths. This made it efficient but its characteristic had a distinct residual kink. It was a very successful valve but its characteristic was not quite straight enough to give the ultimate in audio quality at high output levels.
The KT66 was essentially a 6L6G redesigned with a larger cathode and a shorter, fatter anode. The KT66 had less rapid acceleration, longer electron paths, and almost no kink. It was ace for audio hi-fi but the electrons took longer to reach the anode and were more open to influence from magnetic, etc, fields on the way. Moreover, under HF conditions the electron stream was not perfectly in phase with the grid signal and this resulted in a loss of output power.
The KT8 was based on the KT66 but the longer electron path (compared to the 6L6 and 807 types) was a disadvantage at the high radio frequencies. Not a problem at AF but the KT8 was pretty useless above 15 MHz whereas the 807 was still doing great things at 60 MHz.
In the end the British Services abandoned the KT8 in favour of the American 807. Attempts to make 807s in the UK were largely unsuccessful.
The anode is made of plates, shaped to increase surface area and blackened to radiate more heat.
The classic envelope is 50 mm in diameter and, excluding the B5 base pins, is 113 mm tall.
References: Private communication. Type KT8 was first introduced in 1938. See also 1938 adverts.

 

Pin Connections
B5
1
2
3
4
5
tc
g2
g1
h
h
k
a

 

Absolute Maximum Operating Conditions
Tetrode
Vh
Ah
Va
Vs
Vg
mAa
mAs
Pdriv
Pdiss
Pout
freq
f.max
6.3
1.27
600
300
-100
85
6.0
0.5
25
38
25MHz
100MHz
Updated February 05, 2021.
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