Funny Aussie Lamps
- Thread starter Grog12
- Start date
There are some lamps that have position requirements. Some say "burn base down" meaning they must always be pointed up. Others are rated "base down to horizontal" meaning they can go as far as horizontal but if they go any farther you are going to kill them. Nothing Aussie weird about them, they are in use here as well. We had some in college that were "base down to horizontal" and you had to be very careful about how you placed the instrument. Life before the HPL! That's about all I know. This sounds like a topic for Ship to give us the full details on...
OH SHIP... you out there buddy?
OH SHIP... you out there buddy?
Logos
Well-Known Member
Hanging older theatre lanterns upside down can open a world of pain.
Over heating can happen because ventilation used to be on the top only. I walked into a theatre once where six old fashioned fresnels had been hung upside down and the very young tech was standing on the floor wondering why they were smoking. The paint was burning off the top. A few seconds after I walked in before I'd had the chance to run them down two of the lamps blew explosively.
I'm with Gafftaper, some lamps need to burn base down, shortens their life if you don't. Don't know the theory but I'm sure Ship can explain.
Then of course there is all the stuff on the front, barn doors, colour frames, top hats, donuts you name it. Not many older lamps have working retainer clips. I've actually seen things like barn doors gaffer'd to lamps to stop them falling off.
PAR cans can hang anyway you like upside down or sideways. Enjoy.
Any way what do you mean funny Aussie lamps? If we do it it's right. We are Gods.
Over heating can happen because ventilation used to be on the top only. I walked into a theatre once where six old fashioned fresnels had been hung upside down and the very young tech was standing on the floor wondering why they were smoking. The paint was burning off the top. A few seconds after I walked in before I'd had the chance to run them down two of the lamps blew explosively.
I'm with Gafftaper, some lamps need to burn base down, shortens their life if you don't. Don't know the theory but I'm sure Ship can explain.
Then of course there is all the stuff on the front, barn doors, colour frames, top hats, donuts you name it. Not many older lamps have working retainer clips. I've actually seen things like barn doors gaffer'd to lamps to stop them falling off.
PAR cans can hang anyway you like upside down or sideways. Enjoy.
Any way what do you mean funny Aussie lamps? If we do it it's right. We are Gods.
If you go to the Nuwiki on hanging a light you'll see what I mean....
http://www.controlbooth.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5556
http://www.controlbooth.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5556
Logos
Well-Known Member
OK I had a look. Not a lot wrong there. The point that US C-Clamps and Australian/UK Hook clamps are completely different beasts now appears. I will give it some more thought.
Hughsie pretty good definition. I made a couple of spelling alterations and put in the C-Clamp thing. Can we post pictures in Nu Wiki? Might do that just to show the difference.
Hughsie pretty good definition. I made a couple of spelling alterations and put in the C-Clamp thing. Can we post pictures in Nu Wiki? Might do that just to show the difference.
Ok, I see what you're talking about now. Well most folks down under use Selecon and Selecon doesn't use an HPL lampj. Due to the banana shape their lamps mount straight up. I can certainly see how it would be bad to mount one upside down due to the heat management sytem. The things are designed so that as much IR as possible is passed out the top of the lamp through a heat sink, while the visible light is aimed forward by a cold mirror. If you mount one upside down your heat will want to come right back up into the instrument instead, which can't be good. I don't know what kinds of lamps they are using but it could be that they are using something that is a "burn base down to horizontal"... which again makes sense due to the way heat is dealt with.
On the other hand up here with a Source 4, Shakespeare, or SL... it's almost impossible to mount one upside down due the the fact the lamp points straight in the back.
Let's wait and see if Ship can give us a lesson on position specific lamps.
On the other hand up here with a Source 4, Shakespeare, or SL... it's almost impossible to mount one upside down due the the fact the lamp points straight in the back.
Let's wait and see if Ship can give us a lesson on position specific lamps.
Hughesie
Well-Known Member
That would probably work, but I fear my sign would burn under intense heat.
I was thinking of introducing a crash course in lighting into the (non-existant) curriculum.
Well that's a good place to start. Hey Charc... a note to store in the back corner of your brain. If you do ever get in a situation where an instrument has to hang at an angle that the gel frame has ANY chance of falling out... head to the auto parts store and buy a roll of "muffler tape". It's a thin aluminum tape with high temperature glue perfect for use on stage lights... and it's pretty cheap too. Just tape your gel frame in place. It's also great for securing black foil wrap to an instrument. It will leave some residue but hey you can't have everything and a little goof off will take care of the residue.
Well, it was at an angle, and falling.
Wait, is SAWyer talking about the original post?
Have to bear with me a while on not checking in to the forum much, my fiancee and I have moved out of the master bedroom where my computer normally is - she likes when I’m on the computer going to sleep in hearing me typing away. Anyway it’s time to paint it as the first room done amongst many TBA. This with long hours in a touring season that just won’t let up means long hours and no time any time soon life will return to normal.... just wait a year and a few months from now and I’m sure I’ll be totally gone in doing instead dancing lessons and calligraphy. Anyway, it’s a sun porch in Victorian Bombay concept and I’m on like the 10th coat of paint, this not including layers of clear gloss between (thank the powers at be for my pneumatic sprayer at least for this clear gloss at least.) A few weeks from now, no doubt about that in that I have not even gotten to folliage yet and just put the second color of sky on the ceiling and walls, than get to re-touch up the lattice work & corner blocks... yup, life is going to be a bit less on the computer for a good long time, this in addition to meeting the large family a second time as the to be etc.... Marriage, good thing... just wish the build up to it as with the painting in a if we are going to do it, we are going to do it well were easier to do without so much work.
"You need to pick a color", in general... Ok, I can do that.. what for? Our wedding colors, and I'm learning so much about plastic colored plates under the plates for food nobody will care about etc.. ok, let's go black. Didn't expect that non-color would result in anything but it did and further. This all started in cound down the day I proposed, as if, na, not something someone has been planning out a while now and was just given the go word, or first night the date was already set in stone. None the less, black was of course changed - as if I didn't already know this but back to the painting the bedroom question. Asked a simple question at a local Menards while I was shopping for paint in waiting for a pop show to end so I could remove the lamps to the follow spots. Just asked if their base black was red or blue based.... we all know if we study paint that Black is not a natural color, it's a form of one or the other in doing so. My Honda for instance is a blue base to it's black. Fascinating that the guys there that mix paint for a living responded that it's black and just plain black. OK... silly me for asking. See below about concepts in if you are going to be doing something for your living, being the best at it you can be. Believe the Menards black base color is a red base to it but it's hard to tell given it's not alone in a field with other colors but this is important as a question.
Most stage and studio halogen lamps these days are universal burn. They have either smaller filaments which require less support in any number of certain directions, or are often better supported. Not always but most lamps of today are burn in any direction if used for our industry. There are a few holdouts, mostly of older designs in lamp type or very high wattage types.
Fixture cooling requirements is another issue which can also become a factor not because of the lamp but how it’s able to cool itself without overheating. Once long ago put a FEL into a small hole poked large soup can so as to simulate a star effect projector. Worked to a point but only just that given the size of the filament wouldn’t much project pinpricks of light, instead it projected as if worms of light. That fixture was sealed tight so as not to have stray light. Yup, you guessed it, the lamp and fixture didn’t last long. Lamp base and wiring overheated, lamp itself also went bad soon.
Imagine the various gasses within any type of lamp as if wind in going from the hottest to coolest part of the lamp. Depending upon pressures within the lamp, this can actually turn into serious wind effect upon the filament that’s for the most part in it’s molten almost liquid state if there is something about the cooling effect that’s not supported against or even. Filaments as with finger prints on a lamp often blow away from that part of the lamp which was touched. It’s sort of blown away from this area. Filaments within a fixture not designed to cool the lamp properly in a heat travels up type of way might also have problems of heat build up effecting as with the above lamp base, it’s wiring and the lamp itself no matter how well supported. Hmm, burn angle, remember some 1800 Watt Colemar moving light wash fixtures in their original way of doing them which used some lamps that had a burn position of +/- 15 degrees. Not a fixture to say put on a diagonal much less articulating truss. Who will have thunk it before I started spending like $6K a week in spare lamps for these things. Gee, they worked well in testing...
Lamps and fixtures, gotta read and follow the instructions for them.
Tell me the specific lamp and I’ll tell you about it. In general most lamps these days are universal burn. The fixture might have problems, but as also said, if up side down, your fixture also has problems with even if it has a gel frame clip, it’s still up side down.
“This way up” What a great concept!!! really cool one. A stencil printed with this would be a good thing. This with the crash course in all that is hanging and focusing fixtures properly.
“So...when you say upside down, do you mean that the little nubbin in the end of the lamp on the glass is pointing towards the stage,” That’s often the pinch seal from when the gas is pumped into the lamp, nope in lamp terms they say “Base Down to Horizontal” or something like that. That means lamp base down. While it is important where that pinch seal “tit” often called is placed, that’s not the primary concern where lamp cooling or proper installation is concerned, instead it’s in reference to the lamp base in given this is something easily found and understood. Often however where that tit is will effect the performance of one’s reflector if not even on a follow spot if the lamp will strike an arc or not. For the most part that’s a proximity of the arc gap or glass to the reflector type of thing and the fill tube pinch seal such as in a cyc light tends to want to be pointed away from a reflector so as not to get too close to it.
Such burning position notes and fill tube/pinch seal notes will be noted in the fixture manual - good read always even on a stage pin plug. Never imagine how many people just king of wing it in never reading such things and guess wrong in an unsafe way. Five minutes of reading the instructions - imagine that, verses a life of hack work... Gee, these NEMA 5-20 plugs on the thing, never saw them before so I spent an hour swapping them out for NEMA 5-15 Edison plugs so they would fit into my norm of what should fit within a NEMA 5-20 outlet... This from a 20+ year experienced tech person that it would seem doesn’t read or study much or not things about stuff. He still works in the industry, works hard in fact in making a living for himself, climbs the ladders to focus lights etc. and that’s what he specializes in, and about all he does in specilizing. Hard type of career to retire from not so far from now for him in not even getting a concept of 20A verses 15A plugs. Not how much school or where you go, it’s all about you and from school or industry what you take with you and in the end learn on your own. Such concepts of fill tubes and even base positions, this much less actual lamp specs, makes one stand out as the person in charged if you get a clue about them sufficient to understand and make work. Makes you management at some point if you can specify and direct or correct. If not... a lamp is a lamp type person... makes you ladder climber at retirement age and worried about what you are going to do.
Lamps no matter what continent, in general becoming a master of your trade not just installer dime a dozen... that’s what a career verses job is based upon.
And now back to our normal conversation after the Ship type slant on this....
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Hang in there Ship. The whole getting married thing is quite the ordeal. You have to pretend to care what color the plastic spoons are. It's not ok for her to choose, you have to choose together... but the only way you can successfully choose together is if you successfully guess what she really wants.
Good luck big guy, I'm 15 years married and very happy.
Good luck big guy, I'm 15 years married and very happy.
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