Transistor Museum Early Germanium Power Transistor History by Joe Knight BTL Western Electric Page 10

A SURVEY OF EARLY POWER TRANSISTORS

by Joe Knight

THE POWER TRANSISTOR

BELL TELEPHONE LABS AND WESTERN ELECTRIC

The above partial BTL 1854 data sheet, on its original colored paper, was first released by BTL as "Issue 1" on August 20, 1954. New semiconductor technology likely made the BTL 1854 obsolete by 1955 and development was stopped by early 1956 as can be seen in the above release background over-printing which states "Development Dropped".

Note: Many printed articles and materials were utilized in the drafting of this chapter, allowing for its extensive breath and detail. The “Bell System Technical Journal”, the '”Bell Labs Record” and other publications were used as a primary research source or secondary back-up on many specific devices. Where possible, specific device characteristic information was gathered from a fortunate wide assortment of printed BTL/WE transistor data sheets (as shown above) and RETMA/JEDEC semiconductor device registrations. My sincere thanks to all those who so generously contributed to this chapter from their own collections and recollections, knowingly and otherwise.

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