Hello everyone,

Recently, returning home from a business trip, a man sat next to me on the
plane who, it turns out, is one of the engineers on a world war II vintage
B17 bomber. We began to talk about warbirds and their current bomber (the
Liberty Belle (I believe) and the B17 they are rebuilding to fly, the
Memphis Belle (Yes That Memphis Belle of the movie). He mentioned that the
superchargers of the B17's engines are fitted with governors which  use
vacuum tubes. They don't currently have a tube tester and really could use
one. They would really like to have a WW II period US military tube tester
to check the tubes in the superchargers. Of course other tube testers will
work, but they'd like to have one to "go with the plane," so to speak.

 

I mentioned that I'm a ham and that the amateur community has all kinds of
stuff squirreled away, and that I'd start putting the word out for a tester
for them. I don't have cash to buy a tester, I might have something to
trade, perhaps and the Liberty Foundation isn't involved in my search, or
providing any funds for this, I just thought it would be cool to donate a
tester for the plane. They run on donations from individuals companies and
organizations, even accepting work from aviation companies to keep the
bomber flying.

 

If anyone might be interested in donating a working, vintage tube tester
that you'd like to put back to its original use, and/or a good, non-military
tube tester for the same purpose, please contact me off list. 

 

Ron Miller

N6MSA

Dunedin, FL USA

SKYPE Arjay1