(Old fixture icon not appearing on the below list so I chose one.)
Been working on this 1947 - 1963 #1590 Century 6x9 Leko of late. Missing it’s lamp cap and lenses. The lens train is the easy part as with sand blasting the gate ring assembly, taking off like 3/16" off one shutter and at least 1/16" off the rest etc. in re-surfacing. The lamp cap is the difficult part even given I already have a #1560 and #1577 - the #1590 is more close to an Altman #360 series than either of the above. Really like a 360 in fact in style.
While my cut down American DJ pinspot base doesn’t have rolled edges, it is a good fit for a lamp cap in leaving room for cooling and bench focus. Interesting way to bench focus. Found a pictorial drawing of how this fixture works in a Parker/Smith Scene Design and Stage Lighting 2nd Edition from 1968 but first published in 1963. Wasn’t exploded pictorial, but gave me enough info to understand some of it’s missing cap. Just a question of where the socket really sits - I think it’s mounted to the cap but won’t know until I mount a lamp - perhaps need spacers. Found a good photo of the fixture in William’s also 2nd Edition from 1960 but first written in 1947 which helps also.
TBA if I need to add spacers under the lampholder but very possibly not in differing from the drawing but seemingly I can take that up with bench focus.
Also of late been working on some texture gray/black series Altman 360 fixtures.
I’m noting a sort of fixture innovations between these and the hammertone brown Altman’s. (Main point of the post = differences or innovations during the 50's and 60's. to the Leko.)
First is the gate reflector. Somewhere around the Altman brown Leko say c.1962 second generation, the gate reflector became a reflector and not just a light blocking heat sink. (Easy enough to sleeve the black or rusty gate with a more modern gate reflector on either old series as a note.) Efficiency of the radial fixture was improved with this innovation even if still radial fixture, and that innovation held to modern days.
Second was the cursed Clutch Break assembly which anyone with salt will curse in easily broken. but before it there was nothing normally in use for good locking mechanism. Also seemingly what came with that innovation was the yoke knob or at least on one side for such an innovation - first one side with any antique, than to both sides in history. There was knobs and even levers before this, but mostly just bolts with some form of cone washer in use at best and nothing SOP for a fixture yoke mount. Grump about the gorillas about the stage in over-tightening a C-Clamp all you want, imagine what they were doing years ago to both the weaker clamps and a cone washer at the yoke mount in that fixture no longer staying at focus if not falling given no safety cables in use. Still have the problem of gorilla’s in the grid in breaking the clutch cam, but it was a big improvement over no knobs or locking mechanism other than a bolt with cone washer.
Third was the split hinged fixture improvement. The Altman texture Gray/Black fixture has that hinge between the pineapple reflector casting and the gate assembly. The Century and most before it don’t have a hinge there. Don’t know about you but if I’m bench focusing a 360 or even 360Q, that hinge is useful in just looking at where the lamp is in orientation to the reflector center and hole. On the old 360 series fixture I worked on a few weeks ago, just rough bench focus by way of looking at the lamp orientation from the split fixture was in bench focus good enough. This as opposed to at times in the past I remember some failed lamps by mis-turing the bench focus screws a bit too much in not looking frequently at where the lamp was for orientation. Hinged fixture body I think was a really good improvement.
Fourth note would be that gel frame brackets got larger in better supporting the gel frames. That and the lens train focus range got larger in slide. About an inch or less for 1936 fixtures in running the lens train. Somehow the c.1936-1950 Kliegl #1165 rotating lens train as found on ETC Lekos’ got lost in concept, but on the other hand, more range of focus was found overall for a Leko. In the 30's thru the 50's, you had like an inch of focus. On the say c.1947 series Century, you have 1.1/2", on the Gray/Black 360 1.3/4" which seemingly became the standard before the Zoom came out.
Fifth improvement would be the lens train instead of single lens step lenses. Some interest and concepts about when they became dominant, but overall during this say mid-50's thru mid 60's period, there was some huge improvements into Lekos and fixtures in general.
Added note would be the standardization of the gobo slot also common in this period though out there before this. That more about the Halogen lamp in making it standard I think. Wasn’t much worth it before the smaller filament as with much fixture development following lamp development.
Three colors of Altman Leko, lots of other fixtures. Don’t look at them as boat anchors, look at what it is and what it does as per a ‘57 Chevy for classic. This granted I have no interest in used cars but do love old lights. Just got in a early 1900's era box spot today. By early, I mean really early. When I got it, it was scarry in to focus it, you pull on the wiring that slides out the rear thru a hole in it’s slide plate removable rear cover. Rear cover was replaced but I have seen this slide plate rear cover in use before. Horizontal gel frame clips on the front as normal for the very early 1900's, slide plate on the rear.
Interesting for me in observation of it is that the PC lens sticks out into the gel frame area by more than the gel frame area. Was this lens reversed in never seen that before on a box spot? Was the lens added later? Also that it has no real yoke or roundell mounting holes. There is a stove bolt thru one of the cooling holes and some old school plumbers strap as per a washer, and a piece of very old lx6 cut down and later badly mounted to it. Was a desk top fixture no doubt. Fascinating fixture amongst many old ones I’m working on and learning a lot from. TBA more research into it.
Been working on this 1947 - 1963 #1590 Century 6x9 Leko of late. Missing it’s lamp cap and lenses. The lens train is the easy part as with sand blasting the gate ring assembly, taking off like 3/16" off one shutter and at least 1/16" off the rest etc. in re-surfacing. The lamp cap is the difficult part even given I already have a #1560 and #1577 - the #1590 is more close to an Altman #360 series than either of the above. Really like a 360 in fact in style.
While my cut down American DJ pinspot base doesn’t have rolled edges, it is a good fit for a lamp cap in leaving room for cooling and bench focus. Interesting way to bench focus. Found a pictorial drawing of how this fixture works in a Parker/Smith Scene Design and Stage Lighting 2nd Edition from 1968 but first published in 1963. Wasn’t exploded pictorial, but gave me enough info to understand some of it’s missing cap. Just a question of where the socket really sits - I think it’s mounted to the cap but won’t know until I mount a lamp - perhaps need spacers. Found a good photo of the fixture in William’s also 2nd Edition from 1960 but first written in 1947 which helps also.
TBA if I need to add spacers under the lampholder but very possibly not in differing from the drawing but seemingly I can take that up with bench focus.
Also of late been working on some texture gray/black series Altman 360 fixtures.
I’m noting a sort of fixture innovations between these and the hammertone brown Altman’s. (Main point of the post = differences or innovations during the 50's and 60's. to the Leko.)
First is the gate reflector. Somewhere around the Altman brown Leko say c.1962 second generation, the gate reflector became a reflector and not just a light blocking heat sink. (Easy enough to sleeve the black or rusty gate with a more modern gate reflector on either old series as a note.) Efficiency of the radial fixture was improved with this innovation even if still radial fixture, and that innovation held to modern days.
Second was the cursed Clutch Break assembly which anyone with salt will curse in easily broken. but before it there was nothing normally in use for good locking mechanism. Also seemingly what came with that innovation was the yoke knob or at least on one side for such an innovation - first one side with any antique, than to both sides in history. There was knobs and even levers before this, but mostly just bolts with some form of cone washer in use at best and nothing SOP for a fixture yoke mount. Grump about the gorillas about the stage in over-tightening a C-Clamp all you want, imagine what they were doing years ago to both the weaker clamps and a cone washer at the yoke mount in that fixture no longer staying at focus if not falling given no safety cables in use. Still have the problem of gorilla’s in the grid in breaking the clutch cam, but it was a big improvement over no knobs or locking mechanism other than a bolt with cone washer.
Third was the split hinged fixture improvement. The Altman texture Gray/Black fixture has that hinge between the pineapple reflector casting and the gate assembly. The Century and most before it don’t have a hinge there. Don’t know about you but if I’m bench focusing a 360 or even 360Q, that hinge is useful in just looking at where the lamp is in orientation to the reflector center and hole. On the old 360 series fixture I worked on a few weeks ago, just rough bench focus by way of looking at the lamp orientation from the split fixture was in bench focus good enough. This as opposed to at times in the past I remember some failed lamps by mis-turing the bench focus screws a bit too much in not looking frequently at where the lamp was for orientation. Hinged fixture body I think was a really good improvement.
Fourth note would be that gel frame brackets got larger in better supporting the gel frames. That and the lens train focus range got larger in slide. About an inch or less for 1936 fixtures in running the lens train. Somehow the c.1936-1950 Kliegl #1165 rotating lens train as found on ETC Lekos’ got lost in concept, but on the other hand, more range of focus was found overall for a Leko. In the 30's thru the 50's, you had like an inch of focus. On the say c.1947 series Century, you have 1.1/2", on the Gray/Black 360 1.3/4" which seemingly became the standard before the Zoom came out.
Fifth improvement would be the lens train instead of single lens step lenses. Some interest and concepts about when they became dominant, but overall during this say mid-50's thru mid 60's period, there was some huge improvements into Lekos and fixtures in general.
Added note would be the standardization of the gobo slot also common in this period though out there before this. That more about the Halogen lamp in making it standard I think. Wasn’t much worth it before the smaller filament as with much fixture development following lamp development.
Three colors of Altman Leko, lots of other fixtures. Don’t look at them as boat anchors, look at what it is and what it does as per a ‘57 Chevy for classic. This granted I have no interest in used cars but do love old lights. Just got in a early 1900's era box spot today. By early, I mean really early. When I got it, it was scarry in to focus it, you pull on the wiring that slides out the rear thru a hole in it’s slide plate removable rear cover. Rear cover was replaced but I have seen this slide plate rear cover in use before. Horizontal gel frame clips on the front as normal for the very early 1900's, slide plate on the rear.
Interesting for me in observation of it is that the PC lens sticks out into the gel frame area by more than the gel frame area. Was this lens reversed in never seen that before on a box spot? Was the lens added later? Also that it has no real yoke or roundell mounting holes. There is a stove bolt thru one of the cooling holes and some old school plumbers strap as per a washer, and a piece of very old lx6 cut down and later badly mounted to it. Was a desk top fixture no doubt. Fascinating fixture amongst many old ones I’m working on and learning a lot from. TBA more research into it.
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