upgrade kit for 30 yr old fresnels?

[daria]

is there a kit available that I can use to upgrade the socket in a 30+ year old 8" fresnel that will allow it to use a more modern bulb and hence produce more luminosity with a lower wattage bulb? We rented 10 750 W source four parnels and even at 30% it was brighter than the 1000 W Fresnels. It is not in our budget to buy the source 4 parnels right now, however a kit would be great. I figured if there is one out there, you guys know about it.

 

[ship]

Is there an upgrade kit? What specific brand and model of Fresnel are you using???
Overall, there are upgrades for some Altman Studio Fresnels on the market, I even have the only copy of a 5Kw 5000L Fresnel upgrade before they decided my bitching about it not fitting on the fixture it was upgrading was not worth a production line in them - instead they are just upgrading the lamp base. That’s after about 3 versions of the 2Kw Fresnel upgrade after similar bitching and play testing. These were all to resolve heat/lamp base issues and not to resolve any projection/lamp issues though there is a new GE/Thorn 2.4Kw CYX lamp on the market that would be an upgrade in my 2000L fixture not that it’s needed. The 1Kw fixtures do not have such heat issues.

For the most part, a Fresnel of 30 years ago is the same as one of today. 10 years or so ago Altman did revise their reflector into a double reflector type which is probably more efficient, but you can’t really tell the difference. Such reflectors would retrofit on almost any age or brand of fixture if you need to replace old ones. The lenses of today are the same as yesterday as long as for some reason if green they are not in your fixture. Fixture to fixture as long as your reflector is in good condition there will not be much a difference between fixtures. Never saw a green Fresnel lens. Dirty lenses sure, green or bad lenses nope - believe they are all Kupp. That’s so far.

There is little details about lenses and fixtures however, for instance the #65Q is not rated for a 1Kw load. If you have the 1KAF series, than it is but it’s beam spread is slightly smaller either due to internal fixture distancing of lamp to lens -perhaps a heat issue, or a different lens. Same with the 1000L series of Studio Fresnel - it should also be smaller in beam angle, but it on the other hand does use a different type of lamp and lamp base which is higher output I expect for shorter life. (Don’t make me look it up because it’s not the same and you can’t plop a G-22 base into a P-28s Fresnel fixture - apples and oranges especially with cooling.) That’s just with Altman fixtures. The G-22 Based EGT is 500 lumens brighter - not much better.

Is there an upgraded lamp? Nope, none planned either. Sorry, I feel your pain. I take it for granted your Parnels were using 750w/115v high output lamps? Given that’s the case, yep it should have a higher color temperature to start with, than due to operating at a lower voltage - over voltage it will be boosted more still as opposed to the 120v lamp on the Fresnel that’s operating under it’s rated voltage thus dimmer yet. HPL = about 3,250°K, 21,900 Lumens, 300 hours at 115 volts to which it’s normally operating over all of that at about 118v. This gives less life still but more output and color temperature. The 1Kw BTR Fresnel lamp on the other hand is 3,200°K, 28,000 Lumens and 250hours in life (both roughly dependant upon what brand of lamp is in the fixture and it’s actual age.) The BTR however is operating at about 118v instead of it’s rated 120v thus all the above drops, but life goes up.

Ok, I checked the lamp specs. Given them, are you sure the 750w Parnel was providing more actual light, or just seemed brighter? Also that the beam spreads were the same - the less the spread, the more the intensity. Granted the reflector/lens assembly on the Parnel is no doubt much more efficient, but it’s fairly obvious that the BTR lamp has lots more output even if not at it’s rated voltage. Possible it was dim but it’s light at the lamp at least was still more. Depends after that on the reflector efficiency and a Fresnel reflector/optics are not very efficient. Can’t say, don’t have a Parnel though I do have all the Altman fixtures, but if their reflector assemblies are anything like the S-4 Par, than the reflector would be sending at least 50% more light towards the lens. Big difference.

Still, you want to best that danged Parnel? Here is your best chance at it: Instead of the BTR try a nice incandescent DFD, DFT, DRB, DRC, or DRS in your fixture. Hee hee hee, even a old incandescent style lamp some at 115v, most at 120v can best a HPL lamp hopefully. Granted they range in lamp life from 10 to 50 hours and each has differences in their advantages, but they are going to be lots brighter both in color temperature and lumens. Tons brighter in fact. Given you can live with the lamp life. There is your upgrade lamp, ancient technology.