1924-25 Lilor Dome Lamp No. 1988

Hi all,

This is the No. 1988 Lilor Dome table lamp, made by the French Liotard Frères /Paris 1924 -25.
This lamp is found only in the 1924-25 Lilor catalogue, is quite rare, and was probably made in limited numbers those years. I know only of one other surviving example, from a photo taken by Ara Kebapcioglu when visiting PRIMAGAZ (the current name of the Liotard/Lilor Company).

This lamp is equipped with a 300CP gasoline twin mantle burner of Quicklite or Match lighting type (“Allumage instantané avec allumettes” /…”instant lighting with matches”). The generator has a brass flange for quick preheating and the burner has a tip cleaner.

This lamp came without shade and shade holder; the cleaning needle was broken and the rod was stuck inside the generator. I managed at last to get the rod out of the generator by heating the d##n thing till it was glowing red. Took the top end of a TK44 Coleman tip cleaner and made a composite that works very well.

The shade I use is a 12 inch (30cm) opal dome shade similar to the original one, which I think was made exclusively for this lamp. I had to make my own shade holder, couldn’t find that size anywhere and I believe this turned out to be a rather good looking lady.

/Conny

 

Hello Conny, now that lamp is really pleasing to the eye, it has lovely lines, to use boat terminology.

It's great to see it working!

Do you have a before restoration photo? Jeff.

 

Hi Conny.
Fantastic lilor lamp.
very beatiful Conny.
thanks sharing for us.

Gunsoo

 

Jeff, you can also use the terminology you use about women !
The original finish for this lamp was a lacquered oxy brass one, but it wasn’t in a restorable good shape, so I removed it. The polished brass is the finish that most of the Lilor lamps have and I believe its good enough also for this lamp, but I would rather have kept the original finish if it had been possible.

Here is a ´before´ with the lamp on French soil.

Gunsoo - Thanks!

/Conny

 

A small detail question. Is the shade holder supposed to be above or below the small dish part? I'm assuming this is some form of decoration and not a preheater cup.

 

It looks like a preheater cup, but I don't think
you can use it for.

Most of the french lamps were preheated with an asbst clomb.

 

Nils, you are right about the cup as a decoration part. You could not fill it with preheating alcohol without it leaking. I think you can use a preheating asbestos fork for preheating but as mentioned above - this is a match lighted burner.

The position of the shade holder is interesting. In the catalogue and the photo of this lamp from France the shade holder is attached below the cup. This placement can also been seen in an exploded view paper of this lamp, so this is probably how it should be. However, in the image of the “other” known 1988 dome lamp example that Ara made from the Primagaz collection (current Lilor), the shade holder is placed above the cup (as on my lamp display).
I don’t think its matter how the holder is placed but I believe that is good to make the most possible distance between the upper burner apart and the shade dome.

/Conny

 

Hello Conny, that's true!

After 86 years the original finish was past it and it looks great now, Jeff.

 

Without an air vent in the top of the shade, this is a very valid point. Have you had it running for long with the shade on?

 

You have a good point there Nils. After only a couple of minutes the light starts to flicker and the light output is decreased. Soon later there is no way of having the lamp running. First I thought about not having the original shade and shade holder on would have caused the problem (there is a close match thou). Having a second thought I understood the technical impossible design here with no ventilation of the shade. Seeing the small air intake in top of the burner near the upper inner surface of the dome shade, there is no way of getting proper air (oxygen) to the burner. Exhaust gases from the burning process is trapped inside the shade and makes later the burner to choke. I tried to lift the shade a couple of centimetres but it wasn’t enough, nearly 5 centimetres was needed. I tried a traditional kerosene lamp “Vesta” shade on and it worked perfect. The shade was a bit to small 11inch/28 cm for the 12 inch shade holder but for having the lamp running more than a couple of minutes I must have this on.

I don’t know what to say about this, but the lamp couldn’t have been a success with that engineering design. Maybe that’s why it was produced only a short while. It functions very well thou with another shade on. I have thought of connecting a brass tube to the air intake and by bending it downwards x cm getting a better air supply to the burner also with the dome shade on. I will test it some day.

/Conny

 

I didn't actually think of the burner starving of oxygen. What I was concerned about was the glass heating up too much. At least with the burner dying the glass will never get too hot.

 

hello Conny
very beautifull lamp
If you give me the number of the piece you suspect to be an alcohol cup, I will give you the translation
the picture is not clear enough to see
but I think this lamp does not require preheating

for the shape of the shade : have you noticed that the picture of Mr. Ara shade is open
This may be a more accomplished version
it could explains this model type has been producted only one year

 

Hi,

I have made a few test experiments with the air intake and the dome shade on.
First I extended the air tube with a bend downwards near to the lower end of the shade.
No improvement, the light still dies after a while.


Now I made a new extension having the air intake outside the shade. Voila! The performance is perfect and no inference of exhaust gases.



How could this lamp have been performing at 1924??? Have there been many French dissatisfied customers back then? Who knows?
Conclusion: With a burner below a parachute shaped shade you can’t get a good air intake performance.

Now I will go back to the Vesta shade as the proper one until I got a dome shade with a air vent hole.

/Conny

 

Hello Conny, good experiments and we live and learn!

It seems odd to me that a company would have marketed a lamp with that shade, what use is a lamp which will not stay lit!

The engineers who made it, obviously designed it to use an open topped shade, Jeff.

 

Well Jeff, they were French, weren't they?
Perhaps design was more important than function...

Nah! Just kidding.
...Oh, well... Atleast a bit...

 

Yeah Christer, who gives a sh## about performance when it can be made look good !

/Conny

 

Hello Christer, very good!

It is a bonny lamp Conny!

 

How do you explain (amongst others) the 2CV then, Christer..?

 

touché

 

This is the first lamp I have seen that appears to be designed not to work. Even for a French company this seems rather an odd thing to do. I wonder if the original globe had a small hole in the top which may not be visible in the catalogue images. ::Neil::

 

Neil,

I agree with your reasoning, although there is no sign of a shade “hole” in the catalogue image or the exploded view. You would expect a big professional manufacturer as Lilor to launch a functional lamp. I’m not sure a “small” hole will be sufficient with this burner, but I have not tested this, so you might be right.

/Conny

 

Hi again,

I recently got a new opal dome shade for my Lilor dome lamp, now with a vent hole. I tried it on the lamp and……..perfect! I’ve had her running now for an hour and no problems. So that will settle the question about the shade then. It must originally have had a vent hole that is not visible in the catalogue drawing.

/Conny

 

Hi Conny,

is this a reprduction shade?

 

Hi Karli,

Yes, I believe you can say a ”reproduction” shade since it’s not the original one, that would be impossible to obtain. This shade comes from an old glassworks Rosdala in the south of Sweden which have both old and new stock shades. This is a Vesta shade with the neck cut off.

/Conny

 

Thank you,

is the cut off original?

 

Well Karli………the original shade for this lamp you can see in the beginning of this post from a catalogue page from 1924-25. There you can see that there is a slight difference in shape between the original and the one I have. As there are only two examples known of this lamp, mine and the one at Primagaz (former Lilor), there would be easier to find “Santa” in the Sahara then finding an original shade for my lamp. Then you have to do the second best, try to find a substitute shade. The cut off Vesta shade is a good enough replacement, don’t you think? The Primagaz example has an opal Vesta shade with the neck intact; you can also see that one earlier in this post. Furthermore……the shade has been a main issue here for other reasons.

/Conny

 

Excellent!

 

Hi Conny don't missunderstand me.

The problem is to find somebody who can make a cut off.

That is all I wanted to know.

Thank you

 

Hi Conny
what is the diameter of the shade holder , or the useful diameter of the shade at the seat ?

 

Hi Michel,

The shade holder wasn´t present, when I bought the lamp but from the two remaining brass rods, I estimated the shade holder ring to 28 cm.
An alternative would have been 25 cm, but the angle on the two supporting rods would in that case have been bent upwards a bit more to fit.
I made three new support rods and soldered onto a 28 cm wick lamp shade holder ring.

/Conny