Hi, can anyone offer info on this please? The Bray Luta that burner that I think @presscall has talked about previously. No makers mark etc, I think it's pretty young. But I'd love to now more if anyone knows this model. Thanks, Nick
Nice Do these parts unscrew/separate at all? Usually water gravity drip fed onto the carbide below? At that joint? @nicky boy
Yes it's standard carbide style as I said. Upper chamber water, lower carbide. There is no plate or similar inside the carbide chamber that there usually seems to be. There's a nut to set the drip rate so that the dropper cannot rotate on its own. .The hole at bottom is a pipe that goes all the way through, soldered where it projects from the tank, I think to aid tightening/ loosening of the chamber with pipe or lever. The seal is present but hardened, I will try to burn it but would ideally like to find a new seal for safety. I'll add some photos of a complete parts breakdown. But who made it and how old is it?!?!?!
The style of the lamp looks like an anchor lamp, so my guess is that the hole at the bottom is for a rope to keep the lamp steady when hanging from the mast.
@nicky boy The Bray Luta is quite often seen in larger-output carbide lamps, as here in my French lamp. The two jets angled towards each other impact as you see in the photo, creating that shield-shaped patch of luminescence. You’ll notice that on that example of mine the stearite surrounding one of the jets is broken, which fortunately appears not to affect the output. Your burner looks to be in better condition. The Bray ‘Elta’ burner takes those stearite extensions to an extreme, with shapes surrounding the jet outlets that are meant to allow for adjustment of the water drip to give lower lights levels without having the burner block with carbon (soot). John
@presscall , @Nils Stephenson , thanks, I did consider the rope situation and it think that's more likely than the lever to undo the tank, but it's what I did as I couldn't get any purchaee to separate top and bottom. Alas, still no idea of age or nationality though.....
The square section could be just an extra option for mounting. Hang it from the mast with a rope as an anchor lamp or fit it to a post as a general light around the deck. Who knows unless someone can find some literature on it.
With reference to the mounting: Ship's lanterns are not used for illumination, but to advertise their presence as a navigation aid to other ships. Typically a ship will have a white light fore and aft and one up high. The fore and aft lanterns will not normally throw light onto the deck as white light ruins night vision. However there will be a 360 degree lantern higher up - away from direct vision of the crew. Higher lights can be seen from further away. These three white lights, along with a red one on port and a green one one starbord also allow observers to judge the direction the ship is travelling in. As your lantern has 360 degrees of light it is designed to be mounted higher up, probably on some bracket or even a dedicated mount. Sailing ships do not show a white light on the mast when under sail, but will under power. So I guess you could call this a "masthead lamp". For new seals look at this thread for a solution Advice please : Making a rubber seal "thinner" I am sure you can fabricate something to sit on top of the carbide, but it will not stop it working if missing. It is a wonderful find and I look forward to it working
