This guy really is a legend. Out of nowhere, Drops every fan on RU-vid like a bad habit. MIA for 4yrs. Returns as tho he never left. Gets a 100k subs in a week or two. Well done photon.
@@Encrypt- had to get his wife into his country, it cost alot of money so he worked like a mad man for 4 years. theres a video about it on his channel check it out
uhhh you really need to get a clue about the REASON he ‘dropped us like a bad habit’ because that’s very rude and 100% false. any good man would have done the same as Photon in his situation. very proud of the man, myself
@@nicwilson89 Look Mum No Computer, Sam, he's an awesome musician, uses analog and modular synths, not to mention the absolute mad creations. Here on y-ou-tube, worth checking out.
@@ruinsleepless9098 Ohh, yeaaaaa I'm subbed to him. Didn't recognise it as an abbreviation haha, but yea I adore his channel as a musician and electronics nerd with a love of both weird creations and synth-y goodness. Thanks! :D
It makes me so glad to see a youtuber come back after 4 years, and have just as many, if not more dedicated fans. Simply amazing. Best wishes, and keep having dangerous fun!
Thanks for great memories. As I said in the comment to your last video, I worked on transmitters using these rectifiers back in the 1970s. A bank of 12 of these in 2 x 6 phase bridge configuration could deliver 11kV dc at around 40 amps. It was always great to see the dippers jump up as the transmitter HT was started, followed a moment later by the blue glow from the 12 tubes. We didn't use the grid control to vary output power, but simply had the facility to switch one bank completely off to reduce the supply voltage while we tuned up the transmitter. The grid, was, of course, biassed positively by a potential divider of encapsulated resistors so that the grid sat , I think, around half the anode voltage. I seem to remember that the excitation could be turned off to kill the output quickly in the event of an overload on the transmitter (which were frequent!). The high voltage AC was controlled by an oil circuit breaker in the substation which would take a good part of a second to operate, so this fast acting protection by the MARs was important. Incidentally, we always called these tubes "Ex-ee-trons", not "Excite-trons" - don't know if we were correct, but I guess we probably got the pronunciation from English Electric who origianally made these tubes, I believe, when the transmitters were installed in the 1960s. Thanks, from an old transmitter man for bringing this back to life!
The new computer is like a new fresh start for Andy. He's going to use the old intro style again and it's going to evolve into a newer style while he becomes more familiar with the new PC.
He let’s the things being demonstrated be the star of the show. No bullshit. No unnecessary waffling. No rushing. Just sharing a hobby and interest with the world.
@@EeekiE He didn't gain 100K by being pushy and playing games. Most youtube celebrities would lose that in 5 minutes if they stopped pandering and pushing and gaming the system, let alone fell off the face of the earth for 4 years
These mercury arc rectifier exhibitions have been awesome. I've only now recently learned about them a week before your June 21st update and the angry neon blue octopus has impressed me time and time again. Fun fact: Mercury arc rectifiers feature a staggering efficiency of 95-96%. ( With a 20 badass point bonus - hidden )
I miss Aussie50 dude. Seeing him in the background when Andy was talking made me sad. FrontSideBus’ Profile Picture also brought back some memories :) keep up the good work, Andy.
I love these things so much. They have that eerie mysterious aura surrounding them. If I ever have enough money I'll buy one of those "octopus" rectifiers or even commission one if there are none available, I really want to have a running unit in my collection of vintage equipment. Thank you Photon for showing and teaching us how it works
@@MuhammadHanif-bx4pb True but only if it can pass through the glass. Ordinary glass blocks UV, so they use quartz glass on germicidal UV lamps and EPROMs for that reason.
This channel is one reason I still watch you tube. That dry British humor without the juvenile crap wondering when they are going to get fried playing with that much power not knowing what they are doing. Love it
Loving these arc rectifiers. Reading how they work isn't half as good as seeing it in this sort of detail. And never have I been so happy *not* to hear the words "ah, popped it". Thanks for treating these elderly beauties with such respect.
My favorite part other than how he explained how it worked - was when he decided to hook it up to an audio output. That was awesome. And it's a very good demonstration of AM - amplitude modulation and frequency. I just love how he took an analog signal in AC and used it to feed an AC to DC conversation to prove his point. Bravo. It took me back into the 80's and 90's. Now I'm wondering what the lifespan of the rectifier would be if I used it in the same way for a lot of music.
Wondering the same... maybe use the output to some heavy material on a continuous feed for a "nearly unlimited" audio bandwidth(As far as human hearing goes) on the output of the mix. Heck if 2 inch was the Master Standard, think of a heavy bar of magnetic memory type materials in layers to capture the unique output characteristics of each material in the layer. Maybe the 30v layer could carry a digital pulsed signal across it with your analog across the mains. (think time-coding, midi, and any other time lock clocks to synch equipment?) or (furthermore maybe compressed forms of the medium?) Meh maybe nothing new here... but hey, to have a recording venue alight with all these tubes, would be wicked. Now these recordings would be played on a custom venue pa designed for the increased bandwidth of this recording medium to just use stupid amounts of power needlessly... just because it might sound cool. yee. Shrugs shoulders ...if= ...off to another tangent. If I had money I would try to build the worlds most unique music venue, weird, quirky and strange that the whole time off prime time of the "paid shows" people could sign up for time slots to just play and jam through the system at will with doors open and free as a art center to if you chose to hear random artists its free, if you want specific is pay because of having to pay the band. But again, the pay side would just be the support for the freedom of expression of art aside from big music, aside from server platforms... if no one is jamming you'd be able to just walk up plug in and jam with an on staff sound crew 24/7. Feel free to put your opensource music waves out into the ether. Feels good to dream.
OMG, I love this! Not only a great video showing older technology and ways of doing things, but I also love the combination of old and new at the end. It's an awesome and entertaining way to bring life to an older piece of technology as a wonderful visual to the music!
So cool that you show us this stuff. I watched your other video on the 3 phase rectifier and found both of those very interesting. I work in the maintenance field and unfortunately (or fortunately) we don't get to see that stuff that you show us. Thank you so much for making these videos.
Mercury rectifiers are also good for a villain's lair - fry the intruder with voltage, sunburn them with UV and then poison them with mercury if they break it
Said every Hollywood producer about every British accent... Ever! But yeah, the London "cheeky chappy" accent does make you think he's got his fingers in many pies (and mash).
I never thought it possible for a channel to deliver continually excellent output. I have a special love for MARs and been dribbling over the ones in the background for donks. Thanks so much fo this little run.
Best outro ever. Would be awesome in a music video or something. If Photon started a museum with all this cool stuff, I’d honestly fly my ass there from Texas.
@@EeekiE I could imagine him building a giant version, like turning his living room into a Mercury Arc Rectifier with electrodes coming in the windows, with him sloshing around the liquid metal while blue spectral emissions are bouncing off his head.
I'd like to hear more about the technical details of these interesting devices you have. The pros and cons vs modern tech, history of where they were used, what it does, how it functions, etc.. I think I speak for you entire audience when I say we'd love to hear your take on it.
Pro-s and Con-s of these old things: 1. So simple that it's robust as hell. 2. It does very well for the cheapness of the materials - a DIY version can outperform multi-million-dollar modern equipment 3. Horrible response speeds, horribly inefficient, tendency to be made of hazardous materials, difficult to ship or repair
@@dimitar4y ad 2: Cheap materials probably yes, but requires a metric sh!t ton of manual workmanship to be made. Was likely as expensive back then as a modern semiconductor solution today. And I would be very careful about claiming it outperforming a modern equipment - which is a huge lie, especially as this device in most situation could be replaced with something as simple as SCR (thyristor). That is a very robust semiconductor by itself.
@@Sixta16 Can you make a SCR thyristor in your home? HEC NO. Can you make a tube thing? Yes, easily. It doesn't require a "ton" of workmanship. It just requires a jar, some glass blowing equipment and a few pieces of metal. And yes, it will outperform modern equipment for a fraction of the material and production cost. However, it will be GROSSLY inefficient. But also awesome and robust.
@@dimitar4y Don't forget high vacuum equipment, I doubt these things work under a normal atmosphere. A cheap vacuum pump rarely works in these situations, you'll normally need either a diffusion pump or a turbo molecular pump, and neither are cheap
@@zebdeming what are you talking about lol go watch a cody episode. You can make a basic mercury high vacuum pump - just like they did it in the old days!! You think they had lasers and CNC machines back in those days? Don't underestimate the ingenuity of someone strapped for cash and just a stick for equipment!
That exitron looks brand new!!! Thanks so much for sharing! These videos you’ve been coming out with have been ledgends tu. Really one of the main reasons I get on RU-vid anymore!! Thanks for coming back mate! Cheers 🍻
Cannot express with words how happy I am, so much love Photon, all of ur videos are engraved in my childhood and seeing u back here with us is just overwhelming, thank u Photon, u really feel like a part of my family, and everyone else here feels like that too, we love u so much!
It's great to see you back Andy. You are a truly knowledgeable and inspirational guy. Wish you had been my physics teacher, would have been awesome. Looking forward to many more of your videos Keep up the good work.
So glad you are back RU-vid needed some old school awesome creators again. That music responsive tube is the most amazing thing I've seen.. in a long time
Photon owns a company, and did (does?) a lot of stuff relating to lighting. His hobby of working with stuff just kind of progressed into breaking things electrically on RU-vid - and it turns out a lot of people really enjoy seeing things let the smoke out. He's always taught safety and stuff in his videos - and I really appreciate that a long ways compared to similar tubers who do not teach safety or *cough* pretend to touch HV equipment.
@Ghost Heart He was another youtuber that was all about content and chaos. None of this popularity or monetization BS. Sadly, he succumbed to depression and exited this world.
your right . i love the color of the light it would make a great low room light . i don't know how you do it on getting all the old stuff to show us but please keep it up. i am 72 an really like seeing all the stuff that you find. thank you for keeping history alive and more. also having fun is a good thing👍😊
@Ghost Heart well and a few hacks make it better. For example if you've got underpowered tool that can take the power upgrade the motor. Got it all puny not-so-good vacuum going around use it in the shop for dust collection and power takeoff! But may not necessarily be broken but could be repurposed into something better or maybe make it better in some way more suited to your use. Such as adding circuitry to a plain old dumb fan to make it work with say a smart speaker or other smart device even though it was not broken in the first place you fixed it and made it better that ever was so that could really be you fixing something that's not broken depending on how you look at it
Compared to the present day solid state devices, these Mercury arc rectifiers operates with a mesmerising elegance and grandeur. The quote - "Any sufficiently 'advanced' technology is indistinguishable from magic"- candidly complements this.
Regular glass blocks UV-C, which is the really bad one. UV-C lights (sterilising ones) have to be made of quartz IIRC. There's probably plenty of UV A and B coming out, but they're not the big danger.
@@brandschutzerderrwa-mann3879 It's not even acceleration proof. It's supposed to sit still in operation. All that mercury sloshing around. Don't want it to touch any of the higher parts
