Hello everyone,

I found a small price list from 1956.
The French company CLAUDE offered the MBF 80W, 125W, 250W and 400W lamps.
The 80W and 125W lamps have the usual outer bulb shape that was common in Europe up to the mid-1950s.



But I find the lamps with 250W and 400W striking.
It looks like the American BT forms BT-28 and BT-37.
I have not seen this before from a European brand.



Regards

Olav

I’m kinda surprised nobody has commented on this yet, but you post some really neat old advertisements. They give collectors a glance to see certain lighting products in their “heyday”.

Thanks for posting.
 

I wonder why the second page lists ballasts for both 220V and 120V mains. In case anyone is wondering, the mention SELF means a choke ballast (self-inductor) and of course AUTOTRANSFORMATEUR means, well, an autotransformer ballast.

Thank you for the comments.

@Econolite03:
you are welcome. It is difficult for me to write something about your statement.  The comments on "waste paper" are usually little or nulk.  That's my personal experience so far.  Brochures and catalogs about lamps and fixtures are no longer interesting for some people if they are not in English.  Catalogs are always interesting to compare.  Specifically to the content of this flyer: I assume that the MV lamps 250W and 400W were produced directly in the USA with E40 cap for sale in France (export USA to France).


@sol:
I'm not an expert on the old power systems in France.  However, I have found that in some regions there must have been different voltages in the power supply in the past: 110V or 220V.  That would explain the need for the different devices.

Hello Olav, Hello SOL,

Many thanks for sharing this brochures. Im not answering to everyone but I am enjoying reading them. It is notable that Claude was not the only french brand using the BT shape. The MAZDA MAF250W lamp was in a period of the 50s (proof in catalogue of 1654 and 1955) also BT shaped.
First I thought, it makes sense that claude has BT shaped mercury lamps, as I think that they worked together with Sylvania, which back then was mainly an american company and used these globes. However Mazda whom would be more affiliated to Philips also used it. And Philips certainly did not use the BT shape for its HPL lamps. So I might be running circles here.

SOL,
In France we had -especially in rural and mountain areas- until the 60s 110V grids from the early time of electrification.


Best regards,

Alex

@Olav and Alex : Thank you for the clarification. It does explain the availability of both types of ballasts.

@sol:
I'm not an expert on the old power systems in France.  However, I have found that in some regions there must have been different voltages in the power supply in the past: 110V or 220V.  That would explain the need for the different devices.

France (and probably most other European countries) certainly did use different voltages in the past. The UK was no different, I have a list somewhere that shows the voltages in different parts of London in the early 20th century and it could have been anywhere between 100V and 240V, depending on location, also AC or DC..! More recently, I remember seeing 130V lamps on sale in France in the late 70's/early 80's (don't remember exactly, I was visiting quite often around then) so it must have been since then that the lower voltages were removed.

I wonder why the second page lists ballasts for both 220V and 120V mains. In case anyone is wondering, the mention SELF means a choke ballast (self-inductor) and of course AUTOTRANSFORMATEUR means, well, an autotransformer ballast.

Hello sol,

today arrived a parcel from France with an autotransformer.



I didn't think I would ever find another one and in such good condition.
The connections for the 4 different voltages can be seen clearly.

Regards

Olav

That's a very nice ballast you've got there. Now, do the 210 and 230 terminals bypass the autotransformer and just use the choke part ?

@sol:
I haven't had time to check that with a meter yet.  I would be interested too.

@Alex:
MAZDA MV lamps from the mid-1950s have a slightly different shape.  The catalog shows a photo of a lamp MAF 250 and another catalog shows the lamps MAF 250 and MAF 400, but drawn (no photo).  It is very difficult to compare with the CLAUDE lamps of that period.  I have never seen the lamps from a collector before.

Hello Olav, Hello SOL,

Many thanks for sharing this brochures. Im not answering to everyone but I am enjoying reading them. It is notable that Claude was not the only french brand using the BT shape. The MAZDA MAF250W lamp was in a period of the 50s (proof in catalogue of 1654 and 1955) also BT shaped.
First I thought, it makes sense that claude has BT shaped mercury lamps, as I think that they worked together with Sylvania, which back then was mainly an american company and used these globes. However Mazda whom would be more affiliated to Philips also used it. And Philips certainly did not use the BT shape for its HPL lamps. So I might be running circles here.

SOL,
In France we had -especially in rural and mountain areas- until the 60s 110V grids from the early time of electrification.


Best regards,

Alex

Hello Alex,

I found a small addition to the MAZDA MAF 250 lamps with the BT outer bulb shape.
It's not a drawing, it's a photo.
The quality corresponds to the printing technology of the time:



Source: MAZDA Contact N° 46, Mai 1957, page 15

Regards

Olav

interesting to see that! finally gives me an excuse to post about this!

https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co8420522/mercury-vapour-lamp-mercury-vapour-electric-lamp

which interesting has a very similar shape, I knew that Atlas very briefly made 400W BT37 bulbs, and I sort of it had in my head that they made 250W ones although I had never seen one anywhere until coming across the above a while back, but i cant help but note the strange shape, I always just assumed they would be US BT28 shaped, rather then the rounded eastern European/Japanese BT28 that it actually is




(note however the distinctively British/western european base still)

I think this lamp was probably actually made by Claude.  At the time it was made Atlas only made incandescent and fluorescent lamps, its HID were sourced from other lampmakers.  Only after Atlas (Thorn’s) takeover of AEI-Mazda did it gain an HID factory. 

Atlas/Thorn had joint technical interchange agreement with Sylvania of USA since the 1940s on lamps, phosphors, cathode ray tubes and production machinery, and Sylvania had a similar agreement with Claude of France.  The Claude mercury lamps made at Reims in France were therefore developed from Sylvania USA lamp designs (since at the time Sylvania had no own lampmaking in Europe).  The American influence can be seen in this photo via small details such as the punched hole in the cap, used for mechanical fixing to a threaded liner rather than the usual cement used for European HID lamps.  Later French Claude mercury lamps shared other Sylvania design features such as the unique stamped metal flat frames, and being one of the first in Europe to introduce the superior Yttrium Vandadate phosphors.

I am not sure if Atlas and Claude had their own anticompetitive agreements but it is obvious that they knew each other well via the Sylvania link.  So it is logical that Atlas would buy from them, as happened between the two companies in other areas.

interesting! although its worth noting its the French Mazda lamp that seems to have the same Bulb as the atlas does, not the claude, as the Claude advert shows a much more US style lamp


and I definitely have seen at least 2 BT37 400W Atlas lamp that was British made! pictures pinched from Troy Armstrong of the Australian streetlighting collectors facebook group (which looks to have same punched cap)

and Lampy from the Lamp Room

http://80.229.24.59:9232/gallery/displayimage.php?pid=921

http://80.229.24.59:9232/gallery/albums/userpics/10063/DSC09933.JPG

where you have your own comment

"I think Thorn started with the BT bulbs after their 1966 introduction of KolorArc, which was made based on Sylvania's US MetalArc technology. Since Sylvania's early lamps needed the BT bulb, Thorn copied it and presumably standardised the same for Mercury. Until the phosphor was improved, allowing the British-made ED bulbs to be used again."

but that was from 2015, so perhaps new research has changed things?

do you think perhaps Atlas was sourcing in the major lamp components from someone else and sealing them together in their incandescent factory perhaps? or is there actually more to it!

but on that front I am curious why Sylvania/Thorn's MetalArc needed a BT bulb, what made the ED bulb unsuitable at that time?

The difference is the era.

The Claude and CdL Mazda details refer to lamps from the 1950s, and I believe the pictured Atlas lamp of the London Science Museum is from a similar era.  At that time Atlas had no HID lampmaking capability and I believe sourced from Claude.

In 1964 Atlas was transferred from the Thorn Group to British Lighting Industries, which was majority Thorn-owned and merged with the AEI-Mazda lighting company, in which Osram-GEC also held a stake.  From that moment on Atlas had access to HID lampmaking via AEI-Mazda.  A few years later BLI took over the balance of AEI and bought out GEC, and then Atlas' parent company fully owned the most significant HID lampmaking facilities in Britain.  Thereafter it had no need to source such lamps from elsewhere and could produce them itself.  Although AEI-Mazda was owned by GE and looked to that company for its technology, Atlas/Thorn operated outside the lamp cartels and was the arch-rival of GE.  The result was that links between the UK HID lampmaking of Atlas/Thorn with GE quickly weakened, and were replaced by that company's long-term relations with the similarly independent Sylvania.

The ED lamps were considered unsuitable prior to the mid 1960s because they were always fully coated with phosphor.  Tiny amounts of phosphor were scraped away where the inner support frame contacted the dimple of the bulb, and the presence of loosened powder significantly degraded lamp life and performance.  So the BT bulbs were preferred, whose ends could easily be wiped clean.  As soon as improved phosphors and coating methods had been developed, this problem was solved and it was possible to shift to the superior ED-shape lamps.  Those have much greater surface area, and cooler-burning phosphor at the ends, which increases the luminous flux, red ratio, phosphor lifetime, and spatial colour uniformity.