It's odd just how bulked out the A2000 actually is. My version probably weighs about the same as an MA60 (maybe a touch less), there is huge space in there - enough for a midget to live inside! the flatglass actually IS glass. the canopy has a slidey hook thingy to hold it open, but that is probably the only half-flimsy thing about it.

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The first time I went to my local depot there was an entire pallet of scrap ZX3s fitted with electronic gear. One actually had 2 ballasts in it - the first duff one hadn't been removed. ZX1/ZXU1s also seem to have unreliable gear as well, there are a lot of those in the scrap bin. In both cases the ones down here use SELC gear.

It may save power, but I suspect electonic gear actually costs more to manufacture than magnetic gear, has more production miles due to the large number of electronic components inside it and probably has a higher environmental manufacturing cost as well. Add in poor reliability and I'm not convinced all of that outweighs the power saving.

My Black ZX1 has an electronic SELC ballast. I'll have to keep an eye on that one...

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The Alpha 2000 might be sturdy but it ain't tough enough to handle Blackpool Prom!   Many of the A2000s on the Prom have been casually replaced and all of the A2000s north of Talbot Square up to Bispham (a good two-mile stretch) were replaced just seven years after they were first installed. The main problem with the A2000s is the strong winds get hold of the canopies and blow them off or they get ripped off the lantern and hang loose. Now most of the replacements on Blackpool Prom (over 90% of them I would say) are WRTL Vectras which seem much more sturdy. I've seen one of these that had the gear-tray hanging open once (an older Vectra from c.1998 further up the Prom) but on the whole they've behaved themselves well and on the whole you rarely see Vectras with any kind of problem.

The funny thing was the previous lanterns to the Alpha 2000s on the Prom were very flimsy-looking GEC post-tops and yet these lasted for about 15 years with no problems and were only replaced because of the rewiring of the Illuminations and tramway in 1996 (they needed replacing because the light output from them was very poor as well).

Don't forget that the A2000s are expensive too - about £400 per lantern!

The Selenium is a design fault...

...sorry, did I say that out loud?

No wonder they're quite rare then! Blackpool Council only used them for the Prom, Talbot Square and the zoo car park (the zoo was council-owned then). I've never seen any A2000s at all in Lancs County area!



Yeah it seems like a fairly pointless lantern when they have the Iridium and the Trafficvision and I think there's another one as well that I can't remember the name of  
Can't say I've ever seen a Selenium in real life to my knowledge!

The design is horrible, I can't see why anybody in their right mind would want to install them! The accident rates on roads where they have been installed must have rocketed with people being sick as they drive under them, then losing control of the wheel.

I have seen Seleniums in Salisbury, on a mixture of older columns and new ones. I think the Selenium makes the Phosco P700 look like Kate Moss!



The problems I've noticed with Alpha 2000s around here (Well there aren't any in WIlts, but some in the next county across) is that it seems the weight of the lanterns manage to loosen the grubs or something somehow, leaving the lantern to point downwards 45 degrees, then fall off onto the road/pavement/grass! One did it ages ago (which is actually quite funny because its replacement of a Civic is also pointing downwards 45 degrees!), one fell from the bracket and was in a mess at the bottom of the column (and they haven't even installed a new lantern all these months after!) and another Alpha 2000 on the same roundabout is also now pointing downwards 45 degrees! I hope nobody is driving underneith it when it falls... I have noticed it with geared MA50s in the area too, maybe its because they aren't tightening the grubs up enough for the lanterns... Or there's a really fat bird that flies around!

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

There's probably a fat pigeon that's eaten a young kid flying around or something!



What, the P700 has it's compartments too far apart on the 'face' of the lantern?



Okay, here's another one.

Urbis Albany. The lantern body is not secured to the threaded piece of metal that sticks out from the top of it. Instead, a plate of round metal above the lantern body is welded to the thread, then there is a rubber piece and then the top of the lantern. A rivet goes through from a metal plate inside the lantern, through the top of the lantern, through the rubber, to secure to the round metal. (more will be revealed once I get my website done - or I may put some pics on here). Long and short is that when you tighten / loosen the lantern on the tight thread in/out of the bracket, this rivet first cuts a groove through part of the top of the lantern (so instead of a small hole, you have an arc) and then the rivet shears off. this leaves the lantern to spin around on the thread... if you have enough thread showing above the top of the lantern before the bracket then you can use some big wrenches to get the thread out of the bracket, but otherwise the lantern would have to be stripped right down in order to get it off the bracket once the rivet fails.

Maybe this shouldn't be seen as a 'fault', maybe it's a cunning plan so that the rivet fails and then the albany can NEVER be removed!! (cue 'mwuahhahahahaha!')


(maybe this got fixed in newer versions... as mine is a first generation albany)

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So that is how they do it. I did wonder how they made the joint between the spigot and the top of the canopy waterproof. Agreed they haven't choosen the best method!