How do you organize your tubes?

[Enzo]

I am one of those: I know what is in which pile. Every now and then th wife decides there is too much clutter and piles up my stuff, pits it in a box and shoves it into the store room. Then later I go to pay bills and my check register book is nowhere to be seen. Oh I moved your junk...

[Arbutt]

Well I keep EL34 - EL84 - 6V6-6L6GC - 5881 all the pre amp tubes and all rectifier tubes on a shelf. Pairs and quads. Have a massive box of used ones where I box up and mark up notes and what it's come from. I can buy tubes and have them in within 24/48 hrs. So no need to spend a lot on having stock.

[Steve Blackdog]

I have a great system for finding bits and bobs that I have put somewhere safe.

I look for them for about an hour. I give up. I order new replacement parts. Within several seconds of my order being despatched, the missing item miraculously appears precisely where I looked for it before.

[Chuck H]

I have a great system for finding bits and bobs that I have put somewhere safe.

I look for them for about an hour. I give up. I order new replacement parts. Within several seconds of my order being despatched, the missing item miraculously appears precisely where I looked for it before.

I do something similar... Then I make sure to put the newly ordered item in the same place where I found the original. Just to be sure I won't know where it is next time.

[Leo_Gnardo]

Sylvania leads the way! The way things are going my tube collection will someday look a lot like this:



What a waste. I'd be happy to accept 99%, even 98%-ers from Sylvania. 6L6GC's 12AX7'S etc. Gimme a shovel! Hm... maybe a plastic one.

[Diablo]

Where I used to work there was a small electronics shop with a couple of technicians to keep the lab equipment in good working order. They had a stash of tubes in storage in the basement that they hadn’t touched in a few decades. They were well organized in banker’s boxes. Each box contained sleeves of NOS tubes in alphanumeric order. On the lid of each box was a list of type and quantity contained inside. I saved a few hundred tubes from the dumpster.

[gui_tarzan]

I am one of those: I know what is in which pile. Every now and then th wife decides there is too much clutter and piles up my stuff, pits it in a box and shoves it into the store room. Then later I go to pay bills and my check register book is nowhere to be seen. Oh I moved your junk...

This is an older thread but Enzo isn't kidding. I've seen his shop! lol

Edit: I just bought some new cabinets because I found a ton of chips and transistors I had stored away and needed to reorganize. These are the common amp tubes, preamp on the left, power amp on the right. All drawers crammed full of new and used, boxed & matched tubes that don't fit in drawers on the right of those. I still need to print labels obviously. One way to avoid the tube shortages (and higher costs) for myself has been to salvage tubes from old organs. I have enough to last my lifetime and didn't have to pay anything other than time for many, many 6V6s, 12A*7s, (and transformers) etc. and swap meets have helped with JAN tubes. For customer amps I always used new, of course, and typically ordered those in. Since I'm not doing customer work anymore it's not an issue for me. I do feel for those of you that have shops, I hope the shortages don't last long.

Like some of you I have hundreds upon hundreds of non-amp tubes that just sit in boxes.

[Chuck H]

This is an older thread but Enzo isn't kidding. I've seen his shop! lol

Edit: I just bought some new cabinets because I found a ton of chips and transistors I had stored away and needed to reorganize. These are the common amp tubes, preamp on the left, power amp on the right. All drawers crammed full of new and used, boxed & matched tubes that don't fit in drawers on the right of those. I still need to print labels obviously. One way to avoid the tube shortages (and higher costs) for myself has been to salvage tubes from old organs. I have enough to last my lifetime and didn't have to pay anything other than time for many, many 6V6s, 12A*7s, (and transformers) etc. and swap meets have helped with JAN tubes. For customer amps I always used new, of course, and typically ordered those in. Since I'm not doing customer work anymore it's not an issue for me. I do feel for those of you that have shops, I hope the shortages don't last long.

Like some of you I have hundreds upon hundreds of non-amp tubes that just sit in boxes.

Nice. I'm a little jelly My meager stash will be ok for me, personally. But if I take a project I might be up a creek since I too try to order new for such things. My stash is NOTHING like yours.

[gui_tarzan]

Nice. I'm a little jelly My meager stash will be ok for me, personally. But if I take a project I might be up a creek since I too try to order new for such things. My stash is NOTHING like yours.

This is an accumulation of years worth of repairs and stripping old organs and industrial amps. I got some twenty-plus clear-top 12AU7s that are supposed to be the best sounding tube of that variety out of one organ. Plus the plethora of 12AX/AT7s that came with them. My problem at the moment is I don't have a pair of appropriate output transformers for a stereo amp I want to build. All of these parts and no pairs of hardware! lol