Performance characteristics of an MSDC IOT amplifier

CPI EIMAC has provided inductive output tube (IOT) amplifier systems for the television broadcast market since 1988. The key performance advantage IOT amplifiers achieve over other high power UHF amplifier technologies are superior DC to RF power conversion efficiency. Efforts continue to further improve the power conversion efficiency of IOT amplifiers by employing multi-staged depressed collector (MSDC) technology. EIMAC has developed such an amplifier based on the well established K2D60 IOT slated for the digital television service. The MSDC collector design utilizes principles evolved from the VKP-7990 MSDC klystron development program. The purpose of this proposed paper is to illustrate EIMAC's development efforts and provide test performance results of a MSDC IOT amplifier (K3D60).