Novice vintage vacuum tube enthusiasts often pay good money for tubes which do NOT have the value expected. One such scenario involves tubes which may be marked "Made in Great Britain" or "Made in England". A few facts about these two markings can go a long way towards assuring your tube purchases end up meeting your expectations!

 Fact#1) A great many tube companies (RCA, Sylvania, Amperex, Raytheon, etc...) had tubes made FOR them in England by Mullard. Mullard of course was a PREMIER tube manufacturer, and vintage tubes made by them with ANY brand name on them are highly coveted by vintage stereo and guitar amplifier users. A premium price is payed for these lovely tubes, which provide a warm sound rarely met by the products of other companies. These tubes were marked "Made in Great Britain" (NOT "Made in England") and will have a very small acid etched code near the bottom half of the tube containing variants of the Mullard production code. An example might be a Mullard-made RCA 6CA7/EL34 tube, which might have a varient of this example: XF2, then directly below this B1J1. These codes identify the year, month, and actual Mullard factory of production (in this example the "B" standing for the Blackburn facility, which many consider to have produced the very best Mullard tubes).

 These various tube companies which contracted Mullard to make tubes with their names upon them continued to have "Made in Great Britain" printed on their tubes... even long past the time when this was actually true. You will see examples of this all the time... such as when these companies where actually contracting the Matsushita plant (Japan) to produce tubes for them... and yet continued to place "Made in Great Britain" on the tubes. This was of course to continue to enjoy the sales and profits of supposedly "British-made" tubes... but was an unscrupulous lie. If you see a tube marked "Made in Great Britain" WITHOUT that small acid-etched Mullard code, it is a red flag which should make you investigate further: has the small code been rubbed off? Is there a hole in the guidepin of this tube (classic Mullard construction)? Are there ribs running horizontally across the grey plates of the 6CA7 tube (classic Matsushita/Japan construction)?

Fact#2) Most British-made tubes were marked "Made in Great Britain" and NOT "Made in England" (with the exception of Brimar for a short period). A vintage tube marked ENGLAND is likely Japan, Russia, or China manufacture. A great deal of the Russian/Chinese 6L6GC tubes produced in the 80's-90's are marked ENGLAND... these are smaller 6L6GC's shaped like a large 6V6GT, with very small dual disk-getters on the bottom of the tube. They are likely the very worst 6L6GC you can buy, and nearly valueless. Yet many novices pay good money for them thinking they are British tubes.

Familiarize yourself with differences in construction of tubes. In the case of 6L6GC's, you will begin recognizing the few variants and soon know instantly that the tube you hold in your hand is actually a coveted RCA blackplate 6L6GC... even though it is marked "Baldwin" or "Fender". You will know that another tube is a cheap Russian or Chinese even though marked "Made in England" or "USA". Start learning the codes of each major manufacturer and look for them on the glass or base. Soon enough, you will be getting what you pay for every time.

stratbasturd