Hmm, bulb dilemma

In message snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com, Tim+ snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com writes

:-)

I once discovered that British Rail carriage lamps fitted my Boxford centre lathe work light!

My fridge light is currently broken but this one won?t fit. ;-)

Tim

It looks to me like a sodium discharge bulb, couldn?t say whether it is high or low pressure type, certainly the high pressure type need a ballast to work. Might be useful for an outside light but not inside unless you particularly like a bright yellow light effect.

Richard

Go back and steal the control gear. A socket set will open up the metal cover.

Some (even all?) have three pins (rather than the standard two pins on normal BC).

I think you mean ?rescue?, not steal. ;-)

A socket set will open up the metal

Alas not possible I was exaggerated a little bit about the whole lamp blowing over, it was only the lantern off he top that blew off. It?s also in a very public place for performing such rescues. It?ll almost certainly get replaced with an LED lamp so I suppose I could ask the council nicely if they have any redundant control gear. Any idea what I should ask for (exactly)?

Tim

I don?t think it?s sodium. It?s a discharge lamp of some sort (a Philips bulb) but I think it was a white ( or near white) light, not bright orange or pale peachy orange.

Tim

It will be a high pressure mercury discharge light...Needs a ballast. Go back and nick the ballast. They are obsolete. More efficient hat an incandescent lamp but less than an LED

it's probably a SOX one that needs a ballast

Send it to clive (not really he's probably got dozens of them)

Mount it into some kind of display base as a kind of talking point item. B> flog it back to the council. Brian

You also might get arrested for stealing it if there were cctv cameras around when you took it.

Brian

Which are the bluish ones that seem bright and indeed upset my non seeing eyes but seem dim contrast wise, called? Mercury vapour? Brian

I'd suggest just giving them the bulb back personally. Brian

A valid suggestion but not very creative. ;-)

Tim

Brian Gaff \(Sofa 2\) snipped-for-privacy@bluey> I'd suggest just giving them the bulb back personally.

The nearest I've found is a Caramic Metal Halide bulb, one of many made by GE, good for growing plants apparently.

That could be HID or white sodium. Mercury is less likely.

NT

they usually go into goliath screw sockets, E40. A ballast is vital.

NT

On a school trip to London I stole all the bulbs out of the train lavatories*. They fitted the light sockets in my mate's house where we tried them but were a lower voltage and went off like flashbulbs.

Bill

Few years ago the council went round fitting such lights on the decks of the flats. They were all stolen by local horticulturalists.

Bill