Found this today. Been stored in a loft, its previous owner worked for London Transport. It has not seen much work. The container jubilee clipped to the rear of the handle still contains the pre-heater. Base of fount stamped '85'.
As far as I know there was only one batch of these made in about 1985/6 and they were all sold off or scrapped after the Kings Cross fire in November 1987. This one looks correct for a genuine LT1 but there are copies out there. Anything dated after 1987 can't be right and I have seen examples of this type with the three ring globe cage which dates to before 1976. ::Neil::
Well yes that looks almost too good. All the parts are correct but that 1991 tank is too late. The originals had a crude blob of solder to fix the feed tube and had an untidy finish. That one has been carfully finished with a much neater solder job. I would suspect that it is correct but has had the tank replaced. I was told by an ex employee of LT that naked flame devices were banned by LT in 1987 and Tilley confirmed that they supplied the parts for LT1 as a single batch so the tanks all have to be from Tilley stock earlier than Nov 1987. Does a replacement part make a lamp "Wrong"? Something we have all done and I don't know the answer but in this case maybe it does? ::Neil::
That rough looking weld is typical for the model. There were about 30 of these lamps on sale at a St. Albans car boot sale in 1988. All looking unused and with that same crude solder job. The guy flogging them told me where they came from and why but he wanted about the same price as a new Tilley at the time so I didn't buy one. I wish I had because it took me another 30 years to acquire the model. ::Neil::
