A small BF3 tube needs about 1400-1600 volts (slightly more than a PMT). The preamp used for a PMT will serve well for a BF3 as well in most cases.
Be sure to decouple the DC component of the power supply from the preamp with a 200pf or smaller cap of 2-3KV rating or you will fry the preamp.
Pretty cut and dry nuclear instrumentation for all PMTs, BF3 tubes and geiger tubes. Since there is no way to do any form of neutron spectroscopy with PMT's or BF3 tubes, the values and stability of power supplies and amplifiers is a non-issue.
The Gamma Spectrometer that I use with the Canberra multi-channel analyzer is hyper critical, and .01% regulation, just barely makes th' cut.
Richard Hull
Created on Wednesday, May 09, 2001 11:32 AM EDT by Richard Hull