[Amps] Why hasn't solid state replaced tubes?

[TimNebo at aol.com]

In a message dated 3/3/03 9:24:23 AM Pacific Standard Time, 
w8ji at contesting.com writes:

> It would be easy to build a solid state amp capable of 3-4Kw, and baby it at
> 1500 watts. The price wouldn't be any different than people pay now for
> autotune amps


theres a lot of illegal cb type solid-state amps that are 3-4kw and even 
more. i suspect one could be cleaned up enough to be suitable for the amateur 
bands if you were willing to feed it all the current it needs to run. some of 
these guys use up to 8 alternators under the hood for these beast.