The latest vintage lamp to enter the collection is another GEC, but this time MBF/U. A GEC "Truelite" 125W MBF/U 3BC dating from January 1986.



One thing that immediately struck me about the lamp was that it looked "quite big" for a 125W lamp.

Comparison with an Osram 125W lamp (middle) and 80W (right) showed that the Truelite had indeed a "long neck" to the bulb.



Switch on, the arc tube and support can be seen clearly.



Full power was achieved after only a couple of minutes.

I don't remember MBF lamps glowing pink when warming-up, although admittedly it has been a long time since I last saw one in the process! As I remember it, they just started off dim greeny/blue and, fairly quickly, got brighter?

New ones are pink. As they get older the pink turns more blue....

I wonder Phosco, are these all found on Ebay? I keep looking but not finding

Gramma6, maybe you only saw ones that were getting on in days, so to speak. Supposedly, the better mercury lamps with a lot of life left glow a brilliant red in startup (although I have some Venture ones that don't do that). Some of my lamps start red, others are pink:


and in this picture below, all the post tops were switched on at the same time - but some lamps are more red than others (all are MBF - the clear bowl eleco lantern has essentially an MBU lamp, as there's no outer glass to the lamp)



To put into context some dates... that mercury lamp of Phosco152's is about the same age as me!

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Yep all Ebay and luck!

Ok, thanks for the replies! Mercury lanterns were mostly approaching the end of their life as I remember them anyway so perhaps the lamps in them were a bit past-it! I would have been surprised to see a mercury lamp start-up red as I've always associated that with sodium lamps although the mercury lamps look a much warmer pinky-red rather than the harsh neon red of sodium lamps.

Yes it is more pinky, and then it generally goes to a Lilac sort of colour before going normal. The 2nd post top from the right in my photo above is in the Lilac stage.

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Yes, the lilac phase seems a little more familiar. I probably did see mercury lamps in the pink warm-up stage but it's so long ago I've forgotten!    

I don't know why but there's something great about Mercury lamps! They have quite a nice appearence (probably helped by the little white "sock" that each of them has) but I'm quite sure I've never seen them glowing pink before - My town only has about 3 lanterns still running mercury (2 Z5670s and an Alpha 3) but none of these start up pink to my knowledge... There again it's probably been a while since they have been changed.

I've got two lanterns running MBF in the collection - A Prefect and an Alpha 8 MKII, I haven't powered either up yet however I will hopefully power the Prefect up before I go to uni... I have the gear, I just need to buy some wire.

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"I used to rule the world... Now I sweep the streets I used to own."
Remembering GEC.

To me mercury lamps remind me of rural villages, (Grassington springs to mind AFAIK its all Opalos and Jets now). I'm going to try and stockpile some more MBFs before they become obsolete. The ones I have in collection start off a mix of pink to pinky lilac which must mean that they have reached halfway house through their lives.

The closes MBF running lantern to me is, either that GEC Dioptrion up Booth Royd Lane in Rastrick which Chris managed to get a snap of it a few weeks back, or that Revo Solumbra in Halifax on the junction of the A629 & Heath Road.

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From streetlighting to radio, dance through the night whilst the streetlights are glowing outside.