If you have any dead octal tubes break them up and save the old socket pins in the base. It's easy to de-solder the wires in them to get a clean hollow pin. I've found a use for three already. I'm working on a Silvertone R1181 and the outside antenna wire was missing from the terminal on the back cover that connects it to the radio. It plugged into a socket on the chassis. One of those pins fit perfectly so I made up a new wire. The second use; I used them to make a removable power connection on a GE 511 clock radio. The AC cord goes directly to the clock and then to the radio. I made the wires going to the radio part so that I could unplug it from the clock without removing the clock also. I used the female socket for the pins from an old computer four pin connector. It worked out very well.
_________________ "I know nothing about everything" Sgt. Schultz.
3) Those octal pins are also exactly the same size that fits the oddball Hickok test jacks found on some of their older tube testers and signal generators.