06-02-2014, 09:34 AM
The Panaplex ™ display in these is lovely - normally they were made by Burroughs, Beckman or one or two others.
The advantage over previous nixies & pandicons is that they were planar rather than round (though the French made some oval nixies!) - the Panaplex displays used the same basic nixie technology - the gas was a Penning mixture of neon with a few % of argon and some mercury vapour to lengthen the life of the tube by preventing cathode sputtering. The tubes also often has a "keep alive" cathode to maintain low-level ionisation - these tubes need a few photons to kick of the ionisation process so nixies really fared badly in total darkness - striking was very erratic. Some tubes, used in "certain establishments" were doped with a tiny amount of Kr85 (http://doc.telephonecollectors.info/dm/0...801_I2.pdf) which has a short half-life (just under 11 years) - this allowed the tubes to strike reliably in the dark until the advent of keep-alive electrodes rendered the doping unnecessary...
Pandicons - e.g. the ZM1200 series - are really extremely collectable now and fetch silly money. Panaplex display, as they were manufactured in bulk, are not expensive except for rare ones needed to restore vintage kit like Heathkit clocks etc.
The advantage over previous nixies & pandicons is that they were planar rather than round (though the French made some oval nixies!) - the Panaplex displays used the same basic nixie technology - the gas was a Penning mixture of neon with a few % of argon and some mercury vapour to lengthen the life of the tube by preventing cathode sputtering. The tubes also often has a "keep alive" cathode to maintain low-level ionisation - these tubes need a few photons to kick of the ionisation process so nixies really fared badly in total darkness - striking was very erratic. Some tubes, used in "certain establishments" were doped with a tiny amount of Kr85 (http://doc.telephonecollectors.info/dm/0...801_I2.pdf) which has a short half-life (just under 11 years) - this allowed the tubes to strike reliably in the dark until the advent of keep-alive electrodes rendered the doping unnecessary...
Pandicons - e.g. the ZM1200 series - are really extremely collectable now and fetch silly money. Panaplex display, as they were manufactured in bulk, are not expensive except for rare ones needed to restore vintage kit like Heathkit clocks etc.
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