Lets see your vintage shop work lights

[lafester]

Thanks! Mine looks identical to Lugz. I agree... the grey is a better choice.

 

[Private Lugnutz]

Thanks! Mine looks identical to Lugz.

And here I thought there was a third color out there somewhere. I'm going to call mine "bronze" from now on! That sounds better.

 

[lafester]

I have this one for the lathe.
I'm not sure if it's the same maker...

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[ooba tooba]

I’ve done a lot of driveway work with this old sucker.
I’ll have to snap pics of other ones later

 

[ndnchf]

An old service station lamp over my 125 year old drill press. It is wired up using an original period switch.

 

[Davefr]

Old dentist light. Drill press light (better then a retirement light since it's more adjustable. Enclosed florescent fixture converted to 4ea 4' LED's. Machinist lamp with a long gooseneck. The base is attached to a magnet from an old Pioneer speaker and it's very strong. Wooden trouble light.

 

[Levaughn]

The one lying down is a Mc Crosky universal triple joint machinist task lamp. I got it at an Estate Sale for $7 a few years back. I haven;t found a suitable head for it yet.

 

[macgee]

Here are two retirement lamps I restored, mounted them to a Starrett and a Brown & Sharpe magnetic base. I used jewelers bench blocks as bases to stabilize the lamps for when extending them outward. If you want to use them on a machine, flip the switch to de-magnetize off the bench block and then magnetize it to where you want it on a machine like a lathe, bandsaw, drillers....etc.

 

[drivesitfar]

Mac: very cool and practical and useful. I might have to TRY to steal that idea if I can find something close on a shelf or elsewhere.

 

[lafester]

I have a retirement light sitting on a shelf.. may have to try that out as well.

 

[bonneyman]

Man, alot of outstanding lights, guys!

Dave, that wooden handle droplight is freaking awesome!

 

[macgee]

Thank guys, I was happy with the way the retirement lights worked out.

During quarantine stuck at home, not being able to leave the property I restored this Benchmaster mill that needed a lamp and switch but was not able to go out and buy anything, I had to scrounged around the shop and found scraps in the garbage pile. The flex hose literally found in found in the trash can on trash day that came off a an old Sheldon lathe with 5 layers of horrible paint on it, had no idea there was brass, the shade was also painted an old army green, I stripped them raw and then milled a mounting base base for the flex hose, found some hardware and outdoor junction box and a light switch for my house to use as the mill's on/off switch mounted to some existing holes in the mill. To me, I was happy with the outcome for not being able to leave the house, the light works great, the flex is stiff, stays out of the way, the big switch is easy find without looking at.

 

[drivesitfar]

Mac: great find and it's happy you brought him home. nice looking yard and tools too.

just curious do you have to carry that out to your driveway just to use it or was that a one time thing?

thanks for sharing!!

 

[macgee]

I could wheel it out to use but no, just took it out outside to take pics. The mill went to a new happy owner in SF.

But that is my daily view while standing in the shop and very grateful for it. Thanks Drive

 

[Bugeyed Earl]

Wow, that's a cool little mill macgee, it looks great! I'd like to have something like that, I don't have a lot of space in my shop. How common are they?

Not exactly industrial, but here's an old metal lamp/clock from Art Specialty Co. that someone gave me. It was originally brown I think, but someone (badly) resprayed it silver before I got it. The clock still works well.

 

[macgee]

That's a very cool Art Deco lamp Earl,

Having a good working clock in those lamps cant often be said.

That lamp could work well for several situations in a work shop. Noticing as my eyes are getting older, I'm really noticing the need for more light for every machine and if the lamp has a magnifier, even better

The Benchmaster Mill has a pretty large following if you google it, its pretty cool for how small it is and still being a Knee mill however it does has it's limitations but then what doesn't? I think they stop making them around the 60's. They were made in Los Angeles, CA.

I have a bunch of Fostoria, Luxxo and Dazor lamps but no pics yet.

 

[Stillgottimefor1]

That Benchmaster is amazing. Just beautiful.


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[Outlawmws]

Wow, that bench master is even smaller than my Clausing 8520!

Nice one!

 

[Modern Garage]

Here's my Amplex "Trombolite" hanging over my basement work bench. It's supposed to mount to the edge of a desk but I have it overhead in the joists. Not perfect but cleaned up Ok. The switches were really glitchy and I intended to replace them but I figured I had nothing to lose so drilled the rivets and opened them up and cleaned and reassembled. Had to build a new button for one so there's big white plug sticking up in one photo until I come up with an appropriate cap for it.
Joe

 

[Stillgottimefor1]

Really like that one!


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[macgee]

Very cool lamp Modern Garage, I like it a lot, thanks for sharing.

 

[Bugeyed Earl]

I picked up a pile of magnifier lights over the weekend for $20, these will come in handy in the garage. They came from a machinist's estate. Not exactly vintage, but I got two Luxos, one more modern import that works pretty well, and another that's mounted on a rolling stand.

This is the gem of the bunch. It looks like it used to have a label near where the cord exits that's been removed, so I don't know who made it, but it looks like it was expensive. Nicely balanced and has wrinkle finish paint on heavier steel than the others, the ballast is concealed in the lower arm.

 

[macgee]

Nice score Earl, I have those exact same grey mag. Luxor's and use it every single day. A retired machinist gave it to me and it use to be his dad's so they're not that recent. He had to buy his dad a new one because he used it while welding and a couple of metal splatters hit the lens and stuck to the glass. Still works fine.

 

[Stillgottimefor1]

I’ve been looking for the magnifying lamps but they are always priced out of range for my tool budget. Very nice!


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[Modern Garage]

My last lighted magnifier cost me $2 at a garage sale. I probably could have had it free as the seller admitted to being scared of it after burning a hole in the desk when the sun hit it just right.
Joe

 

[Private Lugnutz]

Upthread somewhere I posted USN and Bell System hands-free trouble lights (battery compartment clips to body, long cord to lamp, lamp clips to headband or helmet), and I am going to add this WWII era US Army Signal Corps TL-214, which I found just this morning at the flea market.



It's not a trouble light, per se. (TL- is the Signal Corps prefix for all tools, and all flashlights were classified as TL- items.) But I found it in an old cantilevered toolbox stuffed with vintage mechanics tools, and I have a gut feeling it was being used that way. It would be the perfect size for resting on something close to your work inside the close quarters of an engine compartment too cramped for a drop light.

It's actually a beacon. It was strapped on a Signal Corps BG-121, which was a "Message Bag" dropped with a 5-foot streamer for troops in hostile territory with no radios. (Believe it or not, the Signal Corps was also dropping cages with signal pigeons in WWII. I had one and other Pigeon Company equipment when I was portraying my 1943 Willys MB as a Signal Corps jeep.)




The bulbs are Mazda. It should have two (2) BA-48 batteries (there's a coiled spring affixed in the middle of the tube), which are long gone. When I get this thing fired up again, I'll post an update.



A friend of mine in Oregon has a complete postwar surplus kit in its original cardboard box.

 

[2oolhound]

Very cool light and great find Lug. Thanks for all the info and pics. It would be real handy if one end had a spot lens and the opposite end had a flood lens but none the less that is a very cool light.

 

[Private Lugnutz]

Very cool light and great find Lug.

Thank you, sir.

It takes AA batteries. That was easy. Replacing the bulbs, which were burnt out, was a saga. If you're reading, go ahead and pop a beer.

I had my doubts about the small family-owned local yokel jingle bell front door store in town as a source for the bulbs, but they have surprised me in the past. I put the TL-214 on the counter and provide a basic synopsis of what it is as a renowned muralist I know buying paint smiles and wishes me good luck. The young guys get the flashlight bulb assortment out and start trial and erroring, mainly erroring, as my friend's sister, who works there, and likes to bust my chops, mainly because I bust hers, starts a continuous Greek chorus of jokes about what I'm going to do with a WWII drop message beacon, before they eventually called Murray, who has been there forever, who works in the back fixing screen doors and knows a thing or two about old parts.

But even Murray is stumped.

"Try IEI up in Hazlet," he said. "They have everything."

I thanked them and headed over to the small family-owned local yokel jingle bell front door store in the next town over. A couple years ago I needed a large antique wingnut for an H.D. Smith three-way machinists' screwdriver I had found with a square nut on it instead, and lo and behold, after a 10 minute disappearance act in the back, accompanied only by the only occasional mutter or curse (it was a challenge now, I could tell...), their resident Mr. Fix-It and Old-Fashioned Database emerged with one.

No **** luck this time.

"Try IEI up in Hazlet," he said. "They have everything."

So, after dinner, I head up to Hazlet looking for the famed IEI, which turns out to be Interstate Electronics, Inc., in the inside corner of a strip mall between a Perkins and a Travel Agency. The place was humongous, wall to wall electronica, though the music was public radio, and had more guys working there than customers. Singular, actually, and he looked like the kind of guy looking to set up a hidden camera in a bathroom.

After about five minutes, all the employees - the official uniform was apparently Clark Kent glasses, obscure classic rock band t-shirts, and Chuck Taylors, and the would-be surveillance creep was huddled around the glass counter. You'd've thought it was Interstate Archeology, Inc. and I walked in with a scepter from King Tut's tomb. When the bantering and bickering and blustering ceased, a guy said that Bobby would know, but he left early. Just before I was ready to give up, one of the guys who had been ignoring the conversation and studying the bulb and socket with a monocle, said, "I think it's a two twenty two" and, after a quick test, he was right. They hadn't sold any in years, decades, maybe, and they had a box of a couple thousand of them in the back to prove it.

Cool place.

I bought a dozen for $.99 a piece, but there was closer to 20 of them in the bag.

Voi-friggin'-la!



While not exactly a spot with a long beam, they do have some directivity.

This is aimed at the camera...



And at the bench...

 

[Outlawmws]

But Lugz, you need LED replacements!

 

[Outlawmws]

Lugz. the 222 GE - its a pen light bulb right?




Here you go!

https://www.etsy.com/listing/153057...FgzSnAiNOqhpGAS20sXf1X7vMrqgNVxBoCkLUQAvD_BwE

 

[Private Lugnutz]

its a pen light bulb right?

No clue. I don't think the application would matter as long as it's a 222.

 

[Shiftless]

I don’t think that size and shape bulb was all that uncommon. But people of our age tend to forget how much time has elapsed since we were children playing around with wires, life switches, enormous 1.5 volt dry cells with the screw terminals, miniature porcelain bulb holders and various little screw in bulbs.

Outlaw is right. Those bulbs were in the 2 cell pocket flashlights most doctors kept clipped in their jacket pockets back in the day.

ACE hardware lists these bulbs. Looks like they are not too hard to get. I would maybe criticize your first hardware store clerks.

 

[Private Lugnutz]

I would maybe criticize your first hardware store clerks.

I have zero reason to defend them or the second hardware store clerk, but note that they were both befuddled. They were both certain they had the right bulb, but it wouldn't fit. They were handling the flashlight and the bulbs, not me. If the bulbs are in demand here, for whatever reason/device, and they had them in their display assortment, I'm now thinking they might've had the right one and were just afraid to twist a little harder. They're two-part socket type bulbs and brittle and cracking a little. The guy at IEI handed the pieces to me because he didn't want to break it.

All's well that ends well. I'm pretty much set with 20 bulbs.

 

[Shiftless]

All’s well that ends well indeed!
I‘m glad you were able to get that old light back to life.

 

[Tom99]

Here's one I picked up recently. Made by the Roxter Corp. of New York. It's kind of unique in that the brightness is adjustable and the lamp arm is removable for some unknown reason. It has a audio type plug on the end.

 

[steaks&anvils]

Here's one I picked up recently. Made by the Roxter Corp. of New York. It's kind of unique in that the brightness is adjustable and the lamp arm is removable for some unknown reason. It has a audio type plug on the end.

cool lamp! I would use that for a bedside reading lamp on the night stand! Adjustable brightness is great for that use. I like the industrial look.

Does the lamp arm come apart after the elbow? if so, does it also have an audio plug? does that plug into the base and allow the lamp to now be a "up light" for indirect lighting?

 

[steaks&anvils]

Here's one I picked up recently. Made by the Roxter Corp. of New York. It's kind of unique in that the brightness is adjustable and the lamp arm is removable for some unknown reason. It has a audio type plug on the end.

They are still in business, since 1947! They make residential, industrial, commercial lighting and also custom industrial high intensity lights. They say they will build any light for you from your specs.

I think yours is a custom lamp.



website (where attached picture is from):

TRADITIONAL ROXTER | roxter-lighting

www.roxterlighting.com

 

[Tom99]

cool lamp! I would use that for a bedside reading lamp on the night stand! Adjustable brightness is great for that use. I like the industrial look.

Does the lamp arm come apart after the elbow? if so, does it also have an audio plug? does that plug into the base and allow the lamp to now be a "up light" for indirect lighting?

You're right, Steaks, there is another plug above the elbow. I never noticed that until now.

 

[steaks&anvils]

You're right, Steaks, there is another plug above the elbow. I never noticed that until now.

Cool!

 

[Outlawmws]

That's Awesome! Now I really want one!