Hi all, Relating to a thread here in "Open Forum" recently of wick fed lamps, I will try to display an example of what could have be shown on for example an "Incandescent wick burner" section of the CPL. I know this could be a "nerdy" thread for many of you, but you can find it either interesting or boring as h*ll. I intend to show a bunch of gasoline and alcohol wick fed burner lamps from France, ranging from 1895 to 1930,s. I have left out the most obvious choice from France, the Tito Landi burner lamps, as I gather many of you have already are familiar with that lamp/burner. I have shown some of these burners/lamps on other forums earlier. I think many of these burner/lamps at that time were considered to be used as a prime room light source 1895 - 1910, not as a romantic accessory light! Here is the first burner/lamp 1. The "Harle" burner/lamp The Harle burner is a rare and unusual gasoline wick burner from around 1909. Jean-Baptiste Virgile Leon Harle (what a beautiful name ) received two burner patents in 1909, and this burner is the result of the second patent granted. The special thing about the Harle burner is that it has an integrated cleaning needle mechanism that is controlled by a lever handle. Preheating was made by an asbestos alcohol soaked torch that was inserted through a slot in the gallery. Nice burner and very good performance at 100 CP. In a "Paris - Export" 1909/1910 catalogue I found a page for this "Harle" burner. They call the burner "Bec Benzol"! Benzol is the name of the fuel and is some kind of gasoline. Before shot ….. 1909 patent ….. 1910 Paris-Export catalogue page …. One more burner/ lamp coming tomorrow ….. /Conny
@Conny C - The people who don't know about these will find it fascinating, and those that do already know will never get tired of seeing/reading about them. So thank you for putting it together. Oh and I am in the former group in case you wanted to know...
Well, i don't know how anyone could call this lamp boring?.. Beautiful, more like Thank you, @Conny C .. look forward to more rare and interesting items! Also the close up pics are great.. you can see how the lever works p.s.I realise that Tito Landi is quite well represented, but where would I go to find out about the history and how they came about? These early lamps to me, always look a little like the inventor tried to use a gas-light burner but with a different fuel? If you see what I mean???
@podbros I see what you mean, and I think lamp inventors were inspired by each others in the late 1800,s. The town gas lamps burners as Welsbach etc. were design for a regular feeding of gas to the fixed burners inside the homes. The portable alcohol and gasoline burner lamps I show have attempted other ways of bringing heated gas to form a Bunsen flame. Some portable alcohol burner lamps used a very similar Welsbach burner type for their lamps. You will recognize these burners coming later in the end of this thread. /Conny
Thanks @Conny C ! One more question, then I promise to shut my gob.. When you say 'alcohol'.. do you mean Methylated Spirits? Thanks
@podbros Yeah, I think you use meth (methanol) as an abbreviation in UK. In Sweden most alcohol for stoves and burners are an ethanol type of alcohol, the "T-Röd" (T-red) one can buy in gas stations etc. /Conny
Normally about 10% Methanol, the rest mainly Ethanol with other stuff mixed in (colour, things to make it taste nasty etc)
OK, here we go again! 2. Here is the second incandescent French wick burner, the "Bec AGAZ" ! This is another old and rare French gasoline burner (Benzol/gasoline fed)), the Bec "AGAZ" manufactured by the company "Établissements AGAZ", probably around 1910 - 1915. The burner was available in 5 different sizes from 50 to 300 CP (candles). The "Bec AGAZ" burner in the photos is the No. 3 burner (150 CP) equipped with an alcohol preheating cup and a cleaning needle operated with a removable fiber button. During the first decade of the 1900,s, there were a lot of wick lamp burners invented and produced; alcohol - kerosene and gasoline. These "new" burners could be used on ordinary lamp holders for ordinary kerosene wick burners, 10 or 14 line collar threads (European thread size). So, for example, you can see these "new" burners on contemporary old kerosene wick type Art Deco / Art Noveau table lamps. I mounted my burner n ° 3 on a ca. 1910 French figurative cast brass lamp stand. As you can see from the photos, it works great. No patent is found, but AGAZ catalogue information from 1912 to 1915, is available . / Conny .... my four Bec Agaz burners ….. ….. 1912/1915 catalogue images ...
@Conny C Another wonderful lamp, thank you. It does seem that you must have a magic cupboard, you open the door and yet another fabulous rare old lamp appears! However you do it, please don’t stop! I suppose that during a relatively short period of time design was being pushed forward quite quickly. Varying ideas and designs coming and going. Fascinating, thanks again.
@BigStevie Yes ... 1890,s into the 1920,s was a very intense period both technical a design wise overall. That could also be seen in the burner and lamp making for liquid fueled appliances. That is certainly a most interesting time period to learn more about. /Conny
I don't know specifically about this lamp but Tito Landis even have a breather pipe to allow air into the tank to replace the fuel as it's used up. So definitely no pressure within the tank beyond atmospheric. The only pressure involved is capillary pressure to raise the fuel into the vapourisation chamber. There's also apparently a lump of sponge within the tank of a TL to hold the fuel. Conny's lamp looks very art nouveau to my eye - nice...
You are right David …. no pressure needed or wanted in the fuel container for these burner/lamp. Pressurized fonts would be problematic, so TL used both a breather pipe and a lump of sponge to make sure of a non-pressurized font, for safety reasons. Well ….. that is not the only pressure used in these types of burners. These burners used jets (also four air intake tubes and a cleaning needle) and you need pressure inside the burner body to eject vapor through the jet to feed a Bunsen and thereafter light an incandescent mantle. That vapor pressure comes from first pre heating (by a pre heat cup) and then a self containing process of heat conducting of the burner body(I think I heard similar words when speaking of pressure lamps ). That´s why it is essential that the wick, with its wick tube, is hard packed so no pressure is lost that way. Kind of pressure burner in a way! /Conny
That's correct Conny - the liquid fuel (either alcohol or petrol from memory, each having a different sized jet which seems to be the only way to distinguish them) rises by capillary action into the vapourisation chamber. There, it vapourises due to the heat of combustion above which I seem to recall is conducted downwards via a conducting rod. Vapourisation causes a large increase in volume and thus pressure causing the fuel vapour to escape via the burner plate. I think that's substantially it and quite ingenious too...
Hi @Conny C .. Another beautiful lamp! A question : Is it possible to preheat with the mantle in place? (hopefully) .. Or did you dismantle it to show your lovely lamp working?? Great detail, as always
@podbros I did remove the gallery and mantle to get better pictures of the pre heating and Bunsen. You can easily lift up the gallery with the chimney once you have removed the removable cleaning needle fibrer button. The gallery is fastened with some sort of bayonet fitting. So no need to remove the mantle before lighting the burner ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. Her comes the third burner …. 3. Bec Radia I would like to introduce you to another rather rare French burner lamp. Here is the Radia lamp that came with the "Special Radia burner ". It is a gasoline burner (Shelline, Automobiline, Motricine) with a light output of 120CP. This one is alcohol torch preheated and also equipped with an "automatic" cleaning needle system. This burner can be found in the Paris Export 1909/1910 catalog and the "P-E Paris" is visible on the fiber cleaning needle button. The origin of this Radia burner and the various Radia burners from Paris-Export are from German. This burner orininates from Fritz Altmann, Berlin. In 1906 Altmann manufactured a burner called the "Fabes Brenner" made out of the Fabes patent , and that patent dates from 1910. The Fabes patent is also stamped on the gallery of my Radia lamp. I think most, if not all of the burners presented by Paris-Export are from Germany Paris-Export either imported these burners from Germany or made them on license. The lamp and shades are probably French made for that burner. / Conny
Hi again, here are three new French incandescent burners from the French inventor Louis Denayrouze Louis Denayrouze 1848 - 1910, is a great French inventor of the very first incandescent burners. He launched over 100 lamp/burner related patents from 1895 to 1910. He had a series of gravity and pressure lamp patents, many both imaginative and innovative. It is a pity that probably none of them were brought into production. If so, it would be a sensation to find one. You can see example of drawings of the patents down below. 4. The L.D. Denayrouze burner has a vertical brass heat conduction part, that also serves as hanger rod for the mantle. It also has a horizontal lever that regulates on/off of gas to the jet. Left opens the amount of gas to the jet and right stops the flow of gas and turns off the burner. Fuel is probably some kind of gasoline or mix of gasoline and alcohol. Probably around 100 CP light output. Pre heating with an alcohol torch! This burner was also especially adopted and manufactured in South America, in Uruguay and Argentina. Attached you find images from my catalogue of the "Comalumbra" lamp! The fuel for this lamp is called "Denayrouzine", indicating the source of this burner. …… and some of the fantastic imaginative and innovative patents drawings…. 5. The second type of burner derived from Louis Denayrouze, is what is known to be the "Boler" burner lamp. Boler was a merchant and retailer in Paris and also sold many types of lamps and burners from different manufacturers. This lamp/burner was advertised as the Boler lamp with the Denayrouze burner. We have no proof of how this burner was coming into the hands of Boler; if he was a reseller only or if he had something to do with manufacturing. Here are two types of Boler burner lamps. The first is a small burner with threads for 10 line collar. It has an inverted U-shaped brass rod for heat conduction and is continuously bring heat back from the mantle mounted on the top this U-shaped rod. The burner is equipped with a fiber knob for regulating and open or shut off vapor gas to the jet. Pre heat cup and no cleaning needle function.
6. The sixth burner is what we know as the original type of the Boler/Denayroze burner. It has a lever that could either open or shut off gas to the jet, no regulation function. All these Denayrouze type of burners use "Lusol" as fuel. Probably some kind of gasoline type of fuel. I have tried both alcohol and gasoline and also some mixes of these, but the only effective and optimal was gasoline. These Denayrouze burners use an alcohol pre heat cup for pre heating!
Wow x 3 !!! Interesting that the 2nd lamp you show by Louis Denayrouze has the threads to match a 10 line wick lamp? I presume that is so the new lamp burner could be used in existing founts? Those patents are very intriguing ???
@podbros Yes the advantage with using standard wick lamp collar threads was that you could replace old burners with more light effective burners. The European standard thread size I believe was the 14 line thread collar with the smaller 10 line as a compliment thread collar size. Here is the Bec Ekla and Bec Lilor 5800 from Lilor (Lioatard Freres), Paris. The burners are both in style and design similar to the burner of Tito Landi, and both use gasoline (Benzol)as fuel. 7. The first Bec Ekla can be seen in a Lilor catalog from 1920 and also later in a catalog from 1923/24. This is a very rare burner. This is the only example I´ve seen during my many years of collecting. Probably only made a few years, due to the court case I referred to. Equipped with a brass spirit preheating cup. The light output would be 110 CP. The patent is from 1910. 8. Lilor 5800. This burner with lamps could be dated and found only in 1929 ( maybe a result of a law suit process Tito Landi versus Liotard Freres (Lilor) ). Pre heated with an alcohol torch fork and patent from 1929/1930! Very much like the Tito Landi table lamp. There are a lot of patents from early on very similar to the Tito Landi patent and burner. I know of at least one patent feud between the Tito-Landi and Liotard Freres ( Lilor) company, that was brought to court. First in the civil court of the Seine in 1933 and in the second instance "Cour de Paris" in 1935. The court ruled that Liotard Freres had pronounced a conviction for patent infringement and insertions for unfair competition. They were ordered to pay Tito Landi CHF 10,000 and their storage of burners was confiscated.
9. This Bec Conde burner is manufactured by the French Paris situated Guenet & Abbat company from a patent from 1927 and featured in a 1928 Guenet & Abbat "Succés" brand catalogue. This burner is something special with that U-shaped horizontal mixing tube. Looking very much like a pressure lamp construction, burner wise. An integrated cleaning needle is there and a safety device (brass tube) for air releasing and enabling release from possible overpressure in the tank A well built burner with many burner parts, which is btw. very common for this manufacturer. Gasoline fed burner and is said to give a light output of 120 CP. 10. Bec Anox This will be the last of my gasoline fed burner lamps, the burner "Bec Anox". This is an incandescent burner addition to a very well known old French gasoline wick lamp "Lampe Pigeon". The Pigeon lamp was introduced in 1885 as a gasoline safety lamp, by Charles Pigeon. The lamp was made with a brass container filled with felt stripes and a burner head with a valve. Filled with gasoline you opened the valve and when lit, a small open flame occur. This was not that effective light output wise and around 1910, the Anox incandescent burner was introduced giving a lot more light. This new burner could easily be attached to the old lamp tanks. The Anox burner uses a "carbureting" principle with a round plate of porous stone that converts gasoline to vapor and feeds the Bunsen above. This a very small burner and use very small mantles that is not very easy to find, so I did some mantle trial and error work. It worked out OK, but would have been better with an appropriate mantle. Tomorrow I will start with the French alcohol fed incandescent wick lamp burners. An original Pigeon type lamp ….. and with an Anox burner …..
Fascinating Conny. I have seen a pigeon lamp before but never with the incandescing burner on top. Every day is a school day !
Thanks again @Conny C ! Two quite different examples.. Were there any parts missing when you got them? I suppose mantles are always going to be a case of trialling/testing and wait and see?
@podbros @Fireexit1 Thanks guys! 11. Bec Prefere No. 1 Here is he first alcohol fed French burner, Bec Prefere No.1. Manufactured in the first years of 1900, by the "Société Continentale Nouvelle" (CN). There is a reference to this company and alcohol burners in a French newspapers from 1902 ... "Bulletin de la Société D´agriculture, Science & Arts" and "Le Génie Civil". This burner works according to the Schuster & Baer system from a 1895 patent, with an additional wick heating flame for preheating the burner. This burner has threads that will fit a standard 14 line wick lamp and I found one lamp body that would fit this burner well. The light output is 180 CP. This burner differs a little from most other similar alcohol burners because the jet is not at the center of the burner. On this burner, the jet is situated off center attached to a small brass tube (generator) that is bent up and down from the top of the burner fitting, so that the jet gas enters a mixing tube from below. This way the generator gas would be heated twice and the burner will perform better. The original Schuster & Baer 1895 patent...… 12. Bec Prefere No, 2 Here is the second "Société Continentale Nouvelle" (CN) alcohol burner. Kind of typical Schuster & Baer patent burner with a pilot flame heating a round mixing chamber and with a gas type of burner on top. Light output is said to give 120 CP! I have not found any patent for these "Société Continentale Nouvelle" (CN) burners. Could be burners made without an own patent. I found in French papers two companies that protested against Société Continentale Nouvelle burners meaning they had no valid patent for their burners. At least one claim from "Société Anonyme D´incandescence par L´alcool" ("La Regina"), Paris, went to court. The decision was in favor for "Lampe Regina" against DN! The other protest came from M.Englebert that claimed that his "Bec Apollon" burner had wrongfully been accused for burner infringed by CN (Bec Prefere). He also claimed that the CN burner was made without any valid patent.
@Conny C - Well I have gone from total ignorance of this kind of lamp to being treated to excellent images with wonderful explanations of early manufacturers, design, fuel and even patents. As a direct result I today acquired a more modern Aladdin 23 (I would say a very poor "modern" relative of what you have shown here over the last few days) Your collection certainly has some very elegant and important examples representing the genre and development of these lamps. I would be interested to know if these were financially accessible to many people at the time or if they were an expensive item ? Once again thank you, Chris
