Willis Lamm's
Traffic Signal Collection

(And Street Lights Too)

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  General Electric (GE) "Double Shoulder"
Ceramic High Voltage Series Circuit
Domed Radial Wave Street Light

Perhaps GE's most common ceramic high voltage series street light body was its "double ring" design. This was a far more stout design that could support radial wave reflectors as well as hinged teardrop refractors. The body itself resembled two ceramic insulators stacked on each other.

This is the most common design that I can recall seeing, being produced for over two decades until the aluminum body high voltage luminaires, that first appeared in 1941, became widely popular. This design is special to me as GEs were on the street where I lived as a young child and a GE double ring was probably the first street light that I actually saw.

  Components of the Luminaire

GE's ceramic body had no discernible markings however its design is distinctive. The brown fired enamel on the luminaire body was typically associated GE, plus the reflector bears GE's logo. This particular lamp was most likely a later 1940s model as the mounting hub is aluminum and the fitter on the top of the hub has simply two flat edges with which to tighten the hub with a spanner - similar to GE's all aluminum NEMA style head - as opposed to the earlier design hexagonal casting.

Ceramic body, aluminum hub, phenolic Jones socket,
reflector mounting ring and 20 inch reflector.
Terminals for conductors on the outside of the body.
Ceramic body covered with brown porcelain glaze.
The two rings lent an appearance of a stack of two insulators.
Testing the light before installing the reflector.

Unlike the earlier model street light, this particular body was designed for high voltage series circuits only. By this time lower voltage (110 v.) luminaires were produced with cast iron, and later all aluminum heads such as the "Iron Head" and "Admiral's Hat" lights shown on this site.
"Night view."

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Holophane 882 110-volt Street Light


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