Re: white sodium discharge light (SON)
Adam Aglionby
> I've used 2 bulkhead 70W white sodium discharge lights at work in the yard
> and they're cheap to run and effective. I'm, now considering mounting a
> pair back to back on a telescopic frame as portable worklights to run off a
> generator. This is to replace ordinary halogen floodlights which don't last
> very well in the environment.
>
> Are these SONs prone to damage by vibration or shocks when being moved?
> Especially when lit?
>
> AJH
Added sci.engr.lighting
Not specialist subject but certainly is couple of peoples on lighting.
Seen LiteAll towers on railway works that looked like white SON on
couple of 4 way towers did credible impression of daylight over the
area.
For full coverage, light trespass mightr be an issue, actually pretty
efficient at 100kW, SoftSun
http://www.luminyscorp.com/products/softsun/index.html
Cheers
Adam
TKM
"Adam Aglionby" <ledl...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:f37c9cbf-e1ed-4fea...@c34g2000yqn.googlegroups.com...
Added sci.engr.lighting
http://www.luminyscorp.com/products/softsun/index.html
Cheers
Adam
The White SON lamp, like the standard high pressure sodium lamp utilizes a
small ceramic arc tube inside a compact lamp structure of glass or quartz.
SON lamps, no matter the wattage or construction, are relatively rugged
particularly when compared to incandescent lamps with long, thin tungsten
filaments (such as virtually all linear halogen lamps which operate at
normal "line" voltages).
In other words, SON lamps can take a lot of knocking around without
problems. They're widely used for outdoor lighting on tall poles, bridge
structures, traveling cranes and other moving equipment.
But SON lamps are sensitive to voltage drop. If your generator supplies a
relatively constant voltage (within 10% of nominal rated), all will be well.
If there are voltage dips, the SON lamps will go out and then there will be
a delay of 3-5 minutes while the lamps cool, restart and warm up to full
output again.
Terry McGowan
andrew
>
>> "Adam Aglionby" <ledl...@gmail.com> wrote
>> Seen LiteAll towers on railway works that looked like white SON on
>> couple of 4 way towers did credible impression of daylight over the
>> area.
<snip>
>
> In other words, SON lamps can take a lot of knocking around without
> problems. They're widely used for outdoor lighting on tall poles, bridge
> structures, traveling cranes and other moving equipment.
Thanks Adam, you are spot on for usage and thanks Terry; so it seems worth a
shot then.
Happy New year all
AJH
fur...@mail.croydon.ac.uk
> "Adam Aglionby" <ledli...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>
> news:f37c9cbf-e1ed-4fea...@c34g2000yqn.googlegroups.com...
> On 27 Dec, 11:07, andrew <n...@sylva.icuklive.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > I've used 2 bulkhead 70W white sodium discharge lights at work in the yard
> > and they're cheap to run and effective. I'm, now considering mounting a
> > pair back to back on a telescopic frame as portable worklights to run off
> > a
> > generator. This is to replace ordinary halogen floodlights which don't
> > last
> > very well in the environment.
>
> > Are these SONs prone to damage by vibration or shocks when being moved?
> > Especially when lit?
>
> > AJH
>
> Added sci.engr.lighting
>
> Not specialist subject but certainly is couple of peoples on lighting.
>
> Seen LiteAll towers on railway works that looked like white SON on
> couple of 4 way towers did credible impression of daylight over the
> area.
These don't sound like White Son, which are made in low Wattages, are
expensive, use special (expensive) control gear, and have a shorter
life than most other types of discharge lamps, are less efficient than
most other types and so are unlikely to be used for lighting large
outdoor areas. They're quite pink in colour when compared to other
'white' sources, around 2500K. The largest ones now made by Philips
are 100W, they used to make a 150W one; I'm not sure what sizes the
Iwasaki ones come in. The larger ones, now discontinued by Philips,
did see very limited use in streetlighting, in small lanterns on low
coumns, mainly in pedestrianised shopping areas.
They were never very widely used, and are now rare, having largely
been replaced by low-Wattage ceramic metal halide. They were mainly
used indoors; Burger King at Charing Cross Station I London had a few,
as did some Safeway Supermarkets, but all of the ones which I saw have
now been replaced. For some reason the Philips ones were marked 'Not
to be sold in the USA'. They used a magnetic ballast combined with an
electronic controller which kept the current within very close limits,
and also served s an ignitor. Conventional SON ignitors for small
lamps (~2.3 kV) will not reliably strike these lamps, though they will
sometimes do so after several seconds.
The lamps you saw sound more like some sort of metal halide. There
are pictures of five different White Son lamps on this page:
http://www.lamptech.co.uk/SON.htm
The arc tubes are similar to conventional ON lamps, but somewhat
shorter and fatter the one in my 100W lamp is about 35-40 mm long.
The arc tubes in metal halide lamps are quite different, either
quartz, which are similar to those in Mercury lamps, though somewhat
shorter, or ceramic, which are mainly used in smaller lamps. These
arc tubes are made of similar material to the SON ones, but are larger
in diameter and much shorter, the length often being only about twice
the diameter, sometimes less.
Quartz metal halide:
http://www.lamptech.co.uk/MBI%20Quartz.htm
Ceramic metal halide: