Classic cars forum & vehicle restoration.

[1935Hillman]

Can anyone enlighten me please, Are the copper wire windings on the widely available Lucas dashboard warning lights just cosmetic as suggested by some ?
Just curious

[Phil - Nottingham]

Not that I have seen but some rewind them themselves. The only reason is that 12v MES Bulbs were not made then so use a 12v ESC wired straight. This does work although I have not tried it.

Our 1938 Rover has this setup and I will do the same
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Rover P2
Rover P4
Rover P5 & P5B
Land Rover S2 & S3
Morris Mini Traveller Mk2

[47Jag]

Originally the lamp holders with the external winding, (which I always assume was resister wire) was to accommodate the 2.5volt MES torch bulb fitted. Shorting out the windings would allow a 12volt lamp to be fitted.

Art

[ukdave2002]

We are not answering the original question! I have seen reproduction units that use the winding ant others where it's just there for show.

The original purpose of the winding was to protect the bulb, as a bulb failure obviously won't fail "safe". So by using a low voltage bulb that has a heavy filament with current limitation, the bulb would have a much longer life expectancy.

When the windings fail and have to be shorted a bulb designed for a 25-50% voltage should do the trick.

Dave

[1935Hillman]

Thanks for your various replies and yours especially Dave. Just to further confuse the issue, I recently bought three of them from one of the better known online vintage car spares companies which were shown as having smooth black bodies in the website images but were copper wire bound when they arrived. This just got me thinking that they might all be the same, copper or no copper.
As a further comment on electrical spares in particular but vintage spares in general, the quality is generally poor. In the seven years that I have been rebuilding the streamlined saloon I have had tens of items that have arrived either not working (Lucas wiper motor, wired completely incorrectly) breaking down withing the period of the build (Lucas dash warning lights, condensers, coil) or simply not very well made in the first place.
Aside from this - and not related to electrical - chrome items are generally poorly plated, sometimes very poorly indeed. My new tandem wiper set really needs to be re-plated as it is very rough and will almost certainly bubble and corrode within months. Traders response to questioning quality is usually to shrug and say 'you get what we get'
Decent restoration workshops must habitually re-plate newly-sourced components if anything like a decent finish is to be achieved.
Anyway, I should probably raise this topic elsewhere.