Old, Old lighting fixtures?

[gafftapegreenia]

Whats the oldest fixture anyone has seen/used? For instance, take the Olivette. I've seen drawings and old Kliegl literature, but has anyone seen one or have recent pixtures? I saw some boxfloods at an old local, nonprofit theatre, but since I wasn't there to do lighting I wasn't able to get a closer look. Of course, alot of people, myself included, have experience with the old A-lamp/reflector/roundel striplight, but whos seen or used the old trough version? Additionally, old plano-convex spots pop up on eBay, often by manufacturers no ones ever heard of. I'm curious as to how these old lights look, its so hard to find examples of the earliest electric lights. So, whats the oldest fixture you've recently found yourself around?

[soundlight]

Old century(pre-century-strand merger) radial lekos with the grey, flakey paint, old strand fresnels and R40 strips of the same vintage.

We have one old, old, old kleigl light up in the catwalks just to remind people how nice source fours are. It's a monster probably about 12" diameter and 22" long, narrowing down to a 6" or so opening, with a radial reflector/lamp socket arrangement that takes monstrous lamps.

[punktech]

i've seen some real oldies (my middle school's theater was built in the 1920's and some of the instruments are still surviving and functional) if you want to know more just google for books about the history of lighting, they are out there. don't expect to find much on concert lighting however, it's not a very well documented field.

[jmabray]

Too many old ones to even think about...

The best book out there, imo, that is a good reference book about this subject is called "Photometrics Handbook" by Robert C. Mumm. It has just about every theatrical light fixture ever made in it with lamp, electrical, and photometric info about it. Now it's not so up to date on the moving lights, but those come out so often now, any book is going to be out of date before it gets to the printers.

[avkid]

If you're ever in Southwestern New York stop by and see us. Our instrument inventory is almost completely vintage. Approx. 1930-85

[BillESC]

When I read the thread title I thought you were talking about me....

[DarSax]

Two elephants and a cymbal died for the above comment.

As for my stuff...we have a couple Altman 360's, with aesbestos wiring, I think. (Not the Q). Other than that...well, I just don't know. Nothing like the 30's/40's you guys have though.

[soundlight]

Yeah, all of the century stuff with the grey, flakey paint that I had in HS was asbestos wiring, with old-style twistlocks.

[Van]

Somewhere Around here I have an old handheld carbon arc lamp, I can only assume this was used in as some sort of flood fill from a wing posistion.. Sitting in the lobby of Hollywood Lights in Portland is a 1912 or 27 < can't remember right now> carbon arc spot, completely restored except for a ballast. The Theatre at Tsa La Ghi, where I worked several summers had tons, literally, of old klieg cannons. They were ERS's about 4' < that's feet> < about 1.2m> long and a good 16" in diameter, They had a hell of a throw, well over 100'. We also had old strips at that theatre that took stackable pieces of glass for colorizing, instead of roundels these were one inch by four inch peices of R,G,B,Y(amber) glass.I'd like to ask, how many people have ever pulled the trick of sending an intern or newbie to go "wash" real old fashioned gels ?

[gafftapegreenia]

I just remembered that the theatre we rented to do our musical at last year had two old Carbon Arc Strong Super Troopers. They didn't use them, instead they used their brand new Lycians. This was a highschool and their head tech person, who has been working their for at least 30 years, said he'd fire them up just to show me, but we never got arond to it. Their FOH catwalk was fun too. Everything from old Capital Radials, and Kliegl Radials to 360Q's and Source 4's. Additionaly, they had about a dozen 18" scoops sitting in one corner that they replaced with new L&E cycs, and another dozen or so old 8" fresnels they no longer used. On stage was also a mixtures of Source 4's, 360Q's, and what looked like three "generations" of fresnels. (I know that fresnels don't change but you could tell they were made in different decades)

Thanks for the tip about the Handbook, I'll have to pick one up.