and are capable of giving light, with a useful commercial life,
at an efficiency of about one watt per candle. Lamps called
osram lamps, with filaments composed of an alloy of osmium
and tungsten (wolfram), can be used with a life of 1000 hours
when run at an efficiency of about 1.5 watts per candle.
Tungsten lamps are made by the processes of Just and Hanaman (German patent No. 154262 of 1903) and of Kuzel, and at a useful life of 1000 hours, with a falling off in light-giving power of only 10-15%, they have been found to work at an efficiency of one to 1.25 watts per c.p. Further collected information on modern metallic wire lamps and the patent literature thereof will be found in an article in the Engineer for December 7, 1906.
Mention should also be made of the Helion filament glow lamp in which the glower is composed largely of silicon, a carbon filament being used as a base. This filament is said to have a number of interesting qualities and an efficiency of about 1 watt per candle (see the Electrician, 1907, 58, p. 567).
The mercury vapour lamps of P. Cooper-Hewitt, C. O. Bastian and others have a certain field of usefulness. If a glass tube, highly exhausted, contains mercury vapour and a mercury cathode and iron anode, a current can be passed through it under high electromotive force and Mercury vapour lamps. will then be maintained when the voltage is reduced. The mercury vapour is rendered incandescent and glows with a brilliant greenish light which is highly actinic, but practically monochromatic, and is therefore not suitable for general illumination because it does not reveal objects in their daylight colours. It is, however, an exceedingly economical source of light. A 3–ampere Cooper-Hewitt mercury lamp has an efficiency of 0.15 to 0.33 watts per candle, or practically the same as an arc lamp, and will burn for several thousand hours. A similar lamp with mercury vapour included in a tube of uviol glass specially transparent to ultra-violet light (prepared by Schott & Co. of Jena) seems likely to replace the Finsen arc lamp in the treatment of lupus. Many attempts have been made to render the mercury vapour lamp polychromatic by the use of amalgams of zinc, sodium and bismuth in place of pure mercury for the negative electrode.
An important matter in connexion with glow lamps is their photometry. The arrangement most suitable for the photometry and testing of incandescent lamps is a gallery or room large enough to be occupied by several workers, the walls being painted dead black. The photometer, Photometry of glow lamps. preferably one of the Lummer-Brodhun form, is set up on a gallery or bench. On one side of it must be fixed a working standard, which as first suggested by Fleming is preferably a large bulb incandescent lamp with a specially “aged” filament. Its candle-power can be compared, at regular intervals and known voltages, with that of some accepted flame standard, such as the 10 candle pentane lamp of Vernon Harcourt. In a lamp factory or electrical laboratory it is convenient to have a number of such large bulb standard lamps. This working standard should be maintained at a fixed distance on one side of the photometer, such that when worked at a standard voltage it creates an illumination of one candle-foot on one side of the photometer disk. The incandescent lamp to be examined is then placed on the other side of the photometer disk on a travelling carriage, so that it can be moved to and fro. Arrangements must be made to measure the current and the voltage of this lamp under test, and this is most accurately accomplished by employing a potentiometer (q.v.). The holder which carries the lamp should allow the lamp to be held with its axis in any required position; in making normal measurements the lamp should have its axis vertical, the filament being so situated that none of the turns or loops overlies another as seen from the photometer disk. Observations can then be made of the candle-power corresponding to different currents and voltages.
The candle-power of the lamp varies with the other variables in accordance with exponential laws of the following kind:—
If A is the current in amperes through the lamp, V the voltage or terminal potential difference, W the power absorbed in watts, c.p. the maximum candle-power, and a, b, c, &c., constants, it has been found that A and c.p. are connected by an exponential law such that
For carbon filament lamps x is a number lying between 5 and 6, generally equal to 5.5 or 5.6. Also it has been found that c.p. = bW3 very nearly, and that
where c is some other constant, and for carbon filaments y is a number nearly equal to 6. It is obvious that if the candle-power of the lamp varies very nearly as the 6th power of the current and of the voltage, the candle-power must vary as the cube of the wattage.
Sir W. de W. Abney and E. R. Festing have also given a formula connecting candle-power and watts equivalent to c.p. = (W − d)2 where d is a constant.
In the case of the tantalum lamp the exponent x has a value near to 6, but the exponent y is a number near to 4, and the same for the osmium filament. Hence for these metallic glowers a certain percentage variation of voltage does not create so great a variation in candle-power as in the case of the carbon lamp.
Curves delineating the relation of these variables for any incandescent lamp are called its characteristic-curves. The life or average duration is a function of W/c.p., or of the watts per candle-power, and therefore of the voltage at which the lamp is worked. It follows from the above relation that the watts per candle-power vary inversely as the fourth power of the voltage.
From limited observations it seems that the average life of a carbon-filament lamp varies as the fifth or sixth power of the watts per candle-power. If V is the voltage at which the lamp is worked and L is its average life, then L varies roughly as the twenty-fifth power of the reciprocal of the voltage, or
A closer approximation to experience is given by the formula
| log10L = 13.5 − | V | − | V2 | . |
| 10 | 20,000 |
(See J. A. Fleming, “Characteristic Curves of Incandescent Lamps,” Phil. Mag. May 1885).
All forms of incandescent or glow lamps are found to deteriorate in light-giving power with use. In the case of carbon filaments this is due to two causes. As already explained, carbon is scattered from the filament and deposited upon the glass, and changes also take place in the Ageing of lamps. filament which cause it to become reduced in temperature, even when subjected to the same terminal voltage. In many lamps it is found that the first effect of running the lamp is slightly to increase its candle-power, even although the voltage be kept constant; this is the result of a small decrease in the resistance of the filament. The heating to which it is subjected slightly increases the density of the carbon at the outset; this has the effect of making the filament lower in resistance, and therefore it takes more current at a constant voltage. The greater part, however, of the subsequent decay in candle-power is due to the deposit of carbon upon the bulb, as shown by the fact that if the filament is taken out of the bulb and put into a new clean bulb the candle-power in the majority of cases returns to its original value. For every lamp there is a certain point in its career which may be called the “smashing-point,” when the candle-power falls below a certain percentage of the original value, and when it is advantageous to replace it by a new one. Variations of pressure in the electric supply exercise a prejudicial effect upon the light-giving qualities of incandescent lamps. If glow lamps, nominally of 100 volts, are supplied from a public lighting-station, in the mains of which the pressure varies between 90 and 110 volts, their life will be greatly abbreviated, and they will become blackened much sooner than would be the case if the pressure were perfectly constant. Since the candle-power of the lamp varies very nearly as the fifth or sixth power of the voltage, it follows that a variation of 10% in the electromotive force creates a variation of nearly 50% in the candle-power. Thus a 16 candle-power glow lamp, marked for use at 100 volts, was found on test to give the following candle-powers at voltages varying between 90 and 105: At 105 volts it gave 22.8 c.p.; at 100 volts, 16.7 c.p.; at 95 volts, 12.2 c.p.; and at 90 volts, 8.7 c.p. Thus a variation of 25% in the candle-power was caused by a variation in voltage of only 5%. The same kind of variation in working voltage exercises also a marked effect upon the average duration of the lamp. The following
