Alternative to C-Clamp?

[lieperjp]

What are these things??? These are what we use to hang lights in both our auditorium and our gymnasium. We call them clips. Pictures Attached. Lighting system installed 1970/1971. A bolt/washer is put on the yoke where the C-Clamp would go, then put into a threaded hole. The two slots "clip" into the raceway, then the bolt is tightened so that the light cannot move or come out of the track. Has anyone used or seen these before?

The only good thing I know about them is that they're cheap to make - we needed more last year so we went to a local machine shop and they were only $1.50 each.

[Les]

That "track system" is called unistrut, and the "clips" are unistrut nuts. No need to have them custom made. You can get them at Lowe's or that other place.

EDIT: I looked at the pictures without enlarging them. After looking more closely it doesn't look *exactly* like unistrut, but it's pretty similar.

[gafftapegreenia]

It looks like unistrut, but yours have slots cut into them, but it's still very similar. And I kind hate them, but thats me.

[dramatech]

What you have is a system that is very similar to unistrut. This system was used by Electro-Control from the late fifties up through the late seventies. Electro-Control was previously Ariel Davis, and then eventually purchased by Strand and became their architectural division. Ariel Davis started as a lighting company that built dimmers and patch panels for the church, high school and community theater market. In order to fill out their line, they added lighting instruments. The first instruments were made from extruded aluminum tubes with par lamps and additional lenses. Their raceways used the unistrut nuts, and edison plugs. Eventually, because of their affordability, they moved up to a higher market competing with Kliegl, Altman and others in that price range. They were never really that competitive, but their products can be found in schools and community theaters that couldn't afford anything more expensive. Many curse the EC line, but if it had not been for their inexpensive products, many companies of a better quality would never have lowered their prices, making theater lighting affordable to High schools, small colleges and community theaters. I personally thank them, and at the same time I replace their products as fast as I can.

[Footer]

I have worked places with that system and it is THE MOST ANNOYING THING POSSIBLE. There is nothing better then being on the top of an A-frame trying to get a bolt to go into that stupid clip. Even better when the clip does not seat properly. I would highly sugget addapting that system to a pipe system, it does not require all that much work to do, any company should be able to do it. Added to the the benefit of having nothing real to safety off to.

[MNicolai]

Originally Posted by dramatech

What you have is a system that is very similar to unistrut. This system was used by Electro-Control from the late fifties up through the late seventies. Electro-Control was previously Ariel Davis, and then eventually purchased by Strand and became their architectural division. Ariel Davis started as a lighting company that built dimmers and patch panels for the church, high school and community theater market. In order to fill out their line, they added lighting instruments. The first instruments were made from extruded aluminum tubes with par lamps and additional lenses. Their raceways used the unistrut nuts, and edison plugs. Eventually, because of their affordability, they moved up to a higher market competing with Kliegl, Altman and others in that price range. They were never really that competitive, but their products can be found in schools and community theaters that couldn't afford anything more expensive. Many curse the EC line, but if it had not been for their inexpensive products, many companies of a better quality would never have lowered their prices, making theater lighting affordable to High schools, small colleges and community theaters. I personally thank them, and at the same time I replace their products as fast as I can.

Agreed. I just ripped some of that EC Unistrut-esque rigging out of a space this summer. I've never been a huge fan of it.

[SteveB]

As others have stated, it's probably Uni-Strut. Generic trade name is Channel Steel or some such.

Common alternatives are Versa-Bar and Kindorf, which is the most frequent electrical trade version.

Be careful with channel nuts from other manufacturers to make sure the slots in the nut engages the channel.

Steve B.

[JD]

Used Uni-Strut for sub units such as ACL groups and it worked ok. (ACL bar would then have C clamps on it.)

More intended for fixed architectural locations when you crank it tight and leave it forever. Its core use is in other areas such as wire-ways and conduit frames.

You can get the "clips" with a crimped in spring on the back so that they don't fall out when the screw is undone. Dirt cheap, and I guess that's the appeal.

[rochem]

I just finished a pretty big musical in a very old high school theatre which used these system for all the overhead instruments. Most annoying thing I've ever used, although it might be partly because of how old it was. Took forever to get one of those to finally get into the raceway, and then you had to try to tighten it while still supporting the instrument. Add onto that the fact that there's no place to safety them besides the raceway itself, and you've got a very scary situation.

There were some instruments which, even after I tightened many times, I would come in to find hanging off with only one side of the clip supporting the entire fixture. For many of the instruments, I just ended up borrowing lots of C-clamps and hanging them on some spare linesets, then running cable from the fixtures to other dimmers. Took a while to do, but it kept me from constantly worrying about my instruments falling on the heads of any of the actors.

[gafftaper]

We had one of those systems at my college back in the day. It's not unistrut but it is very similar. That track is actually designed into the bottom of the raceway for those thinking it's unistrut. The unistrut parts won't work the clip is different. I would look into hanging some schedule 40 pipe nearby and forget the track That's what we did back in the day.