invacar LightBulbFun's Invacar & general ramble thread, index on page 1, survivors lists on Pages 24/134 & AdgeCutler's Invacar Mk12 Restoration from Page 186 onwards, still harping on...

[High Jetter]

1 hour ago, LightBulbFun said:

so my 7000th post!

figured id make this mile stone post a LightBulb related as today I got some fluorescent tubes iv been wanting for many years now!

and that is a radar red fluorescent tube, in-fact I got 50 of the buggers! 2 cases of 25, brand new! one case is mine and the other was bought by a fellow collector in the states and ill be mailing it to him in the new year after the christmas rush and all that has calmed down some hopefully, (he is paying shipping!)

the Radar red fluorescent tube is a very rare colour of fluorescent tube developed for use in lighting radar rooms which had green phosphor radar screens, the red lighting helping improve contrast of the green screen (being opposite colours) 

I have wanted a tube in such a colour for many years now, but as they where only really used in military applications they where very rare, although the radar red tube was sold publicly and found niche uses in the same applications you find other solid colour (Red Green Blue Pink Gold etc) fluorescent tubes, and also in meat displays but there where dedicated tubes for that application, so the radar red tube remained a very rare tube

so  I was very happy to come across these, linked to them  by a friend yesterday, they where on ebay being sold by the case collection only, which is very frustrating for someone housebound, but for once things where in my favour and the seller said in the description he could do delivery within central London so I quickly arranged for that and had the 2 cases delivered to me  

turns out the Seller is a black cab driver and so I had my tubes delivered by black cab which I thought was pretty neat!  

I think my current plan is trade the majority of the tubes in my case with other collectors and in the future pick up another case just so I have a complete case of 25  (the seller currently has 8 cases remaining and I dont see those going anywhere anytime soon because apart from myself no one is in Central London!)

(right now im both space and money limited hence why I just got the 1 case for myself for now, they showed up just after I bought myself some other lighting goodies, so its been a bit of an expensive month! but I would like to pick up an addition case in the future!)

 

 there is an even rarer Radar Blue colour for use with orange phosphor radar screens, but this colour was never sold publicly AFAIK and is such is VERY rare and was considered a bit of an urban legend before a couple collectors managed to get their hands on some a few years back

I sadly dont have one of those!

 

these radar red tubes are from the 1st Factory Week January 1984, they must be some of the last as theres no mention of Radar red in the 1984/1985 catalog, and although the 1983 catalog mentions Radar Red, it does not actually list it as available in any tube size

so yeah very pleased with this find   just 1 is pretty amazing but whole cases is something else

(as above I also have some other lighting goodies arriving hopefully in the next few days so ill probably post about those depending how it all goes )  

Only on AS. Good buy, hope it's worthwhile.

[Mrs6C]

14 hours ago, dollywobbler said:

Turns out the Invacar model has been delayed. May be more like mid-2021 now.

The owner of the new four has been chatting to me. He's desperate for glass. I'm hoping Mark has some as I can't think where else you'd get it.

Perspex makes a good, cheap interim solution. Then, as @LightBulbFun says, new glass can be made up to suit or bought in sheets for a local glass cutter to do, such as from this company:
https://www.thevehicleglasscompany.co.uk/Flat_Laminated_Polycarbonate--category--5.html

 

[Zelandeth]

Oh...whole case of Radar Red tubes, that's quite the find!  Never seen one in person so definitely wouldn't mind a pair of they're not already spoken for.

[LightBulbFun]

29 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

Oh...whole case of Radar Red tubes, that's quite the find!  Never seen one in person so definitely wouldn't mind a pair of they're not already spoken for.

Yeah, until I got these I had never seen Radar red in person either, which Is why I have wanted one for many years and was really happy to finally get some!

I was thinking I wonder what your garage would look like if we swapped all the the tubes in it for these radar reds (IIRC every single fixture lighting the garage is a 4fter right?)

and yeah you can have a few thats not a problem, (as mentioned in the post the person/seller I got them from has another 8 cases, so I can always get more if needed  )

(I was thinking it really is a shame I dont have REV with me, would have been fun to pick them up in her ) 

 

speaking of your garage, I could really do with one of your 4 lamp 4ft Atlas fixtures right about now for testing all of these!

currently have them on the go 2 or 3 at a time (giving each tube on test a good hour 2 runs to make sure I burn off any impurities left over from manufacturing)

[sdkrc]

https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0cDovL2pvYmJzdXJmLm1hdHRpYXNwLnNlL2luZGV4LnBocD9xPWNHTmhjM1E2THk5M2QzY3VZbUpqTG1OdkxuVnJMM0J5YjJkeVlXMXRaWE12Y0RBd05IUXhhR1F2WlhCcGMyOWtaWE12Wkc5M2JteHZZV1J6TG5KemN3JTNEJTNE&ep=14&episode=dXJuOmJiYzpwb2RjYXN0OnczY3N6bXFk

@LightBulbFun, not sure if this is of interest but here's a short BBC podcast on the Invacar. I haven't listened to it myself yet but I'm sure you'll be able to correct some of their work

[LightBulbFun]

43 minutes ago, sdkrc said:

https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0cDovL2pvYmJzdXJmLm1hdHRpYXNwLnNlL2luZGV4LnBocD9xPWNHTmhjM1E2THk5M2QzY3VZbUpqTG1OdkxuVnJMM0J5YjJkeVlXMXRaWE12Y0RBd05IUXhhR1F2WlhCcGMyOWtaWE12Wkc5M2JteHZZV1J6TG5KemN3JTNEJTNE&ep=14&episode=dXJuOmJiYzpwb2RjYXN0OnczY3N6bXFk

@LightBulbFun, not sure if this is of interest but here's a short BBC podcast on the Invacar. I haven't listened to it myself yet but I'm sure you'll be able to correct some of their work

ah yeah, heres a short video clip that went with it when it was first aired  

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/stories-45907925

and yeah theres plenty of holes in it, like how they exclusively talk about Villiers powered machines, and make no mention of the massive improvement the Model 70 was over previous vehicles

yet a Model 70 is what they show in the video/pictures! and how they are quite negative about it all, nor did they explain Why they only had 1 seat, and that if you where a married couple or had children, you would be issued an appropriately adapted Morris Minor and or Mini, rather then a single seater Invalid vehicle..

but this is the Media, when are they ever positive about something!

anyways I better go put my soapbox away...

[Mrs6C]

Never let the facts get in the way of a good story! 🙂

[BlankFrank]

On 11/21/2020 at 12:42 PM, LightBulbFun said:

*Brians Brian-ness*

And i thought i was a bit dodgy for wanting to fabricate a tuned 2-stroke pipe for the mk12c and occasionally run it fairing-less for 'weight reduction yo'. 😂

I wonder if the top speed of a mk12 would top out due to limited gearing or if i could get 50+ mph from the old villiers engine with some porting and the tuned 'zorst.

[LightBulbFun]

1 hour ago, BlankFrank said:

I wonder if the top speed of a mk12 would top out due to limited gearing or if i could get 50+ mph from the old villiers engine with some porting and the tuned 'zorst.

I THINK they are gearing limited, but I have never driven one etc sadly but from what I have seen I think if they are gearing limited its to the maximum capability that the ol 11E can do

(as in I dont think you could adjust to the gearing to go faster then 50 on a stock Mk12, to do so you would also need some extra power as well as adjusted gearing)

I do know someone who emailed the ICR to say he got 60Mph down hill in his Acedes Mk15 Model 67 back in the day which is pretty impressive! (and must have been quite scary LOL)

(I also dont know what the red line/rev limit of a Villiers 11E is LOL)

but if you do find yourself gearing limited with more power to spear, then it should be fairly easy to adjust, it is motorcycle bits underneath the body on a Villiers machine

so i think all you have to do is find appropriate sprockets, no need to worry about fiddling with the final drive in a differential or such LOL (and indeed back in the day if you were a large fellow and/or lived in a hilly area they would adjust the sprockets/gearing to suit those conditions)

 

it is worth noting that every single Villiers machine in my DHSS spare parts list is listed as having the Villiers 11E/4SFR Specification Number 419F engine, except for the invacar Mk12 which is listed as having the Villiers 11E/4SFR specification Number 313F engine

I wonder what the difference is, I have it in my head that is it is to do with the ratios of the gearbox, but I dont know exactly where I got that from so who knows

and I have seen a number of other "specification number" Villiers 11E/4SFR engines fitted to various Villiers invalid vehicles of the same Make/model,  so in that view I dont think its gearing related (unless every Model 57 I have seen has happened to have been geared differently from the rest LOL)  so I think I think the ministry eventually just standardised on one specification, but If thats the case I have to wonder why the Mk12 was left different from the rest... and I do still wonder what these specification numbers mean exactly

[LightBulbFun]

On 23/11/2020 at 21:47, LightBulbFun said:

(as above I also have some other lighting goodies arriving hopefully in the next few days so ill probably post about those depending how it all goes )  

first one of 2 of the lighting goodies has arrived 

this big fuck off bastard, a 1000W Flood light, made of the finest chinesium, its quite amusing as its literally like one of those cheap 300/500W halogen flood lights from a DIY store, just scaled up LOL

but that does not bother me, because it came with this slightly ominous looking black box

which is a Control gear box, which unlike the floodlight/box itself actually  contains some decent gear, a 1000W High pressure sodium/Metal halide choke (Ballast) plus ignitor and power factor correction capacitors

(I think it would have been shipped from China to the UK empty then outfitted in the UK, hence the actually decent gear)

this is the reason I bought it, as while I have suitable control gear to run up most types of 1000W discharge lamp, I was lacking suitable gear for the 1Kw euro spec high pressure sodium lamp

so im very pleased to get a gear set finally, the flood light is just a nice bonus,  

in total inc shipping this whole bundle was £55 from ebay which I dont think is too bad when the ballast alone is £200~ from a wholesaler

and I got a 1Kw Metal halide bulb too with it too which is nice, plan to light it soon hopefully gonna be fun, I have lit 1Kw discharge lamps before, but that was free standing, never in any kind fixture to direct the light

so this should be quite bright!

[LightBulbFun]

4 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

first one of 2 of the lighting goodies has arrived 

this big fuck off bastard, a 1000W Flood light, made of the finest chinesium, its quite amusing as its literally like one of those cheap 300/500W halogen flood lights from a DIY store, just scaled up LOL

but that does not bother me, because it came with this slightly ominous looking black box

which is a Control gear box, which unlike the floodlight/box itself actually  contains some decent gear, a 1000W High pressure sodium/Metal halide choke (Ballast) plus ignitor and power factor correction capacitors

(I think it would have been shipped from China to the UK empty then outfitted in the UK, hence the actually decent gear)

this is the reason I bought it, as while I have suitable control gear to run up most types of 1000W discharge lamp, I was lacking suitable gear for the 1Kw euro spec high pressure sodium lamp

so im very pleased to get a gear set finally, the flood light is just a nice bonus,  

in total inc shipping this whole bundle was £55 from ebay which I dont think is too bad when the ballast alone is £200~ from a wholesaler

and I got a 1Kw Metal halide bulb too with it too which is nice, plan to light it soon hopefully gonna be fun, I have lit 1Kw discharge lamps before, but that was free standing, never in any kind fixture to direct the light

so this should be quite bright!

and just got it all wired up and lit, as predicted its stupidly bright  photographs dont do it justice sadly

first a couple pictures just after striking before it has run up to full power/temperature  

 

 

 

and then here it is at full power  to give you some idea how bright it is, this was with the fastest shutter/smallest apature my iPad would do 

and then a close up picture through a CD as a make shift ND filter (it is times like this where I wish I had a proper camera!)

 

to give you some idea how bright it is, here is a picture of the 100W GLS in my room, while the flood light was running

and the worlds most well lit christmas lights LOL (unplugged during the run so I dont overload any circuits)

I look forward to putting one of my 1000W High pressure sodium lamps in here and finally running it to full power should be even brighter as a 1000W HPS lamp is more efficient (it puts out 130,000 lumens where as this 1Kw Metal halide bulb "only" puts out 80,000 lumens, a regular 100W GLS lamp puts out about 1300 lumens for reference!)

[egg]

Perfect interrogation conditions!

[LightBulbFun]

1 hour ago, egg said:

Perfect interrogation conditions!

Hah that nerver actually occurred to me  I have something hopefully coming soon (number 2 of the goodies) that would be even better at that (or maybe work a bit TOO well given said thing hopefully arriving soon, puts out such a tight and powerful beam that im pretty sure it can set fire to things at close range, lighting that one without actually setting something alight in my room is going to be fun...)

 

continuing with the new toy

I dug out one of my 1000W high pressure sodium lamps and fired it up, now everyone on the block probably thinks im growing "tomatoes " (or that my room has caught fire, but knowing this neighbourhood probably the former LOL)

and fully run up  

bonus shot of it making the 2x70W 6ft T8's that light my desk look like they are almost switched off! (impressive when you consider they where just behind the flood light as you can see from the cut off shadow in the wall

and the red hot arc tube cooling down after switch off  

[LightBulbFun]

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/324392272933

another Solocar for sale! EJ6342 this time, 3rd one in about a year now! but this one is beige for extra shite points  (well I say Solocar, technically its an Auto-Electric carriage rather then a Solocar, but the Solocar was a face lifted Auto-Electric carriage)

it is one I have known about but was not quite sure who owned it etc, I remember it well because its one of the very few vehicles that dont show up in ANY of my 3rd party tools (must be something to do with how it was registered with the DVLA when its original reg was V765ed etc)

and it also had a news article written on it  https://www.cambrian-news.co.uk/article.cfm?id=116823&headline=Readers offer details on 1930s invalid carriage&sectionIs=news&searchyear=2017 

its nice to see that its still in good shape, I hope it gets bought by someone who will continue to use it from time to time!

maybe @dollywobbler can buy it and return it to wales?

I love all the detail pictures in the listing, I have of course saved those to my computer for future reference and archival purposes  

[LightBulbFun]

Aww 

was quite looking forward to getting it

this was the listing, which the seller still has up, I wonder if he refunded me because he was not happy with the best offer he accepted? (I sent him a Best Offer of £7.50 which he accepted on the 22nd then I got a refund just now...)

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/293790646440 (if he was genuine out of stock, then I would expect the listing to be pulled)

I have a bought another one at the buy it now price (as I do want one!) it will be interesting to see if the seller magically finds stock suddenly 

(even at the full buy it now price its still a damn good deal when they cost £270 via normal channels! http://www.cp-lighting.co.uk/Tungsram-SPL1000-PAR64840-G38-1000W-77V )

[sdkrc]

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353297729663

[LightBulbFun]

27 minutes ago, sdkrc said:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353297729663

so he IS selling them then, those are @OliD-E's Model 70's (thanks for the heads up btw ) 

he has been going back and forth on selling them for a while now, I hope whatever happens they go to a good home  

(ill just CC the usual closet Invacar lickers @bobdisk @wuvvum @Cavcraft apologies if I have missed anyone out! and do let me know so I can tag you next time round, although I suspect this is a bit more of a project then any of yall want to undertake)

[wuvvum]

Already at over a grand RNM and nearly at the North Pole.  Ah'm oot, unfortunately.

[wuvvum]

By the way you forgot to tag in @BorniteIdentity.

[LightBulbFun]

43 minutes ago, wuvvum said:

Already at over a grand RNM and nearly at the North Pole.  Ah'm oot, unfortunately.

well the reserve has been met now just dont look at what the bidding is at now LOL , seems prices have sadly well and truly gone a bit silly!

if they are nearly at the North pole, then TPE376S WAS from the north pole as that one was rescued from the isle of Skye! (and previously spent its ministry life on the shetland islands )

poor thing really has no chassis, I remember when @OliD-E first got it, I was looking at this picture of it from probably a couple years back

when he sent me this picture when he went to pick it up

and I ask "wheres the battery/chassis leg?!"

and he went (paraphrasing a little probably) "I dont know its just gone!"

which I thought was very autoshite LOL

[bobdisk]

18 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

so he IS selling them then, those are @OliD-E's Model 70's (thanks for the heads up btw ) 

he has been going back and forth on selling them for a while now, I hope whatever happens they go to a good home  

(ill just CC the usual closet Invacar lickers @bobdisk @wuvvum @Cavcraft apologies if I have missed anyone out! and do let me know so I can tag you next time round, although I suspect this is a bit more of a project then any of yall want to undertake)

Got no way of getting it home since some b*** stole my trailer. Its going to cost £200+ to move the Daf to new place.

[LightBulbFun]

12 hours ago, bobdisk said:

Got no way of getting it home since some b*** stole my trailer. Its going to cost £200+ to move the Daf to new place.

ah shit, sorry to hear that, I do hope it is eventually found!

if you need a trailer just to get you out a pinch to transport some smaller bits and bobs, your more than welcome to borrow my Model 64 trailer if its any use? (but its much smaller then your car trailer and I have no idea how road worthy it is although I think its tyres are in good shape at least, that trailer was my 1 silly purchase, im hoping some day it might redeem itself by donating its unobtainable wheel studs to another Invacar or something, or I somehow get enough Model 64 bits to nail it back together LOL)

 

as a side note there are a couple members worldofceri and Wingz123 who do car/thing transporting, worth keeping them in mind next time you need to have something transported I say  

(and theres also the people @Mrs6Cuse who transported REV and Dolly for us down to the FoD)

[Woollen797]

On 11/23/2020 at 9:47 PM, LightBulbFun said:

so my 7000th post!

figured id make this mile stone post a LightBulb related as today I got some fluorescent tubes iv been wanting for many years now!

and that is a radar red fluorescent tube, in-fact I got 50 of the buggers! 2 cases of 25, brand new! one case is mine and the other was bought by a fellow collector in the states and ill be mailing it to him in the new year after the christmas rush and all that has calmed down some hopefully, (he is paying shipping!)

the Radar red fluorescent tube is a very rare colour of fluorescent tube developed for use in lighting radar rooms which had green phosphor radar screens, the red lighting helping improve contrast of the green screen (being opposite colours) 

I have wanted a tube in such a colour for many years now, but as they where only really used in military applications they where very rare, although the radar red tube was sold publicly and found niche uses in the same applications you find other solid colour (Red Green Blue Pink Gold etc) fluorescent tubes, and also in meat displays but there where dedicated tubes for that application, so the radar red tube remained a very rare tube

so  I was very happy to come across these, linked to them  by a friend yesterday, they where on ebay being sold by the case collection only, which is very frustrating for someone like me who is housebound, but for once things where in my favour and the seller said in the description he could do delivery within central London so I quickly arranged for that and had the 2 cases delivered to me  

turns out the Seller is a black cab driver and so I had my tubes delivered by black cab which I thought was pretty neat!  

I think my current plan is trade the majority of the tubes in my case with other collectors and in the future pick up another case just so I have a complete case of 25  (the seller currently has 8 cases remaining and I dont see those going anywhere anytime soon because apart from myself no one is in Central London!)

(right now im both space and money limited hence why I just got the 1 case for myself for now, they showed up just after I bought myself some other lighting goodies, so its been a bit of an expensive month! but I would like to pick up an addition case in the future!)

 

 there is an even rarer Radar Blue colour for use with orange phosphor radar screens, but this colour was never sold publicly AFAIK and is such is VERY rare and was considered a bit of an urban legend before a couple collectors managed to get their hands on some a few years back

I sadly dont have one of those!

 

these radar red tubes are from the 1st Factory Week January 1984, they must be some of the last as theres no mention of Radar red in the 1984/1985 catalog, and although the 1983 catalog mentions Radar Red, it does not actually list it as available in any tube size

so yeah very pleased with this find   just 1 is pretty amazing but whole cases is something else

(as above I also have some other lighting goodies arriving hopefully in the next few days so ill probably post about those depending how it all goes )  

On some buses they used red or blue tubes near the entrance to reduce the glare on the windscreen. The slimmer tubes on the newer buses gained a plastic sleeve in the desired colour rather than the tube itself being coloured.

[LightBulbFun]

5 hours ago, Dick Longbridge said:

I reckon LBF bought his in the nick of time,  looking at the way prices are going for these. 

Yeah sadly I could see this coming a mile away

which is why against most peoples advice to wait until I was in a better life situation etc, that I made such a push to find and get one when I did

because I knew that if I waited until any longer I would miss the boat, and I was not going to let that happen here, after life had screwed my out of most of my other interests and life opportunities etc

 

it is a shame to see the prices go a bit silly as it pushes them out of the shite-o-sphere, and this forum is the only forum where Invacars are appreciated for what the are, and actually get used!

and the prices going silly just puts them more in the sights of flippers and the such like

[LightBulbFun]

1 hour ago, Woollen797 said:

On some buses they used red or blue tubes near the entrance to reduce the glare on the windscreen. The slimmer tubes on the newer buses gained a plastic sleeve in the desired colour rather than the tube itself being coloured.

Yeah, I remember them well as a kid  (and Tungsten lit Routemasters had a little cut off shield on the bulb next to the cab)

although is worth noting you could/can get coloured T8 tubes, but I suspect they simply sleeved regular white tubes because it was cheaper then buying coloured tubes and also a filtered coloured tube is much dimmer then an actual phosphor coloured tube

 

and finding a proper Red tube is quite hard these days

see red (and gold) tubes where always of the filtered type (as in they had a red (or yellow) coating on the glass itself as well as the phosphor coating) as its pretty much impossible to get a saturated Red or yellow light just from phosphors alone in a fluorescent tube (as the bare mercury discharge of a tube outputs its own blue light)

but the one problem with doing that is they put out a lot less light then their unfiltered counter parts like Blue green Pink etc and the old school red and yellow coatings used cadmium

so in more recent times most mfg's just made phosphor red tubes which are more magenta then red because of the blue light from the mercury discharge (and this is basically what radar red tubes where, which where developed for large quantities of red light, rather then saturated red light)

and as such getting proper filtered red tubes can be quite difficault, I think Philips are the last making Filtred Red and Yellow/Gold tubes

 

heres an example of some old school red tubes (these are ex MOD stock hence the lack of much branding, but the top 2 are Osram GEC and the bottom 2 are Thorn BLI)

and heres an example of the Thorns lit up  

[wuvvum]

That last photo reminds me of Amsterdam for some reason.

[dollywobbler]

 

[LightBulbFun]

1 hour ago, dollywobbler said:

 

keep up at the back!  (but on a more serious note I appreciate you sharing it incase I had missed it!) I feel like its become a bit of a game of "find something Invacar related that LBF has not already found/seen etc" LOL

On 03/04/2020 at 00:17, LightBulbFun said:

wonder what the story behind this is! looks a bit too well put together to be a random/chance recording, perhaps the user of KPC532P was known for stopping for pigeons so someone setup a camera to record it?

 

On 03/04/2020 at 00:49, LightBulbFun said:

continuing to over analyze it, I think perhaps the second part of the video may have actually been a chance recording

but with the first part recorded later to say "this is a pigeon" cuz ya know no ones ever seen one of those before! LOL

 

it just has me somewhat perplexed LOL just that little random/unexpected especially for 1991, where someone would have had to have been actively recording on a proper video camera

rather then today where someone could quickly record something with a smartphone etc

 im still a little perplexed by it tbh LOL

[dollywobbler]

Hey, I've not got time to go through 169 pages.

I've spent most of today getting tagged in various posts about the ones Olli is selling!

[Eyersey1234]

2 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

"find something Invacar related that LBF has not already found/seen etc" LOL

 

 

Sounds like a good game 😂 I'm up for that