Thorn Civic 1

Lantern acquired in December 2004.

This is my first lantern to use a compact fluorescent lamp, so I'll be interested to see how it compares to the brightness of other light sources. It, and several others were used to replace some heavily vandalised Beta 5s on a footpath but unfortunately they met a similar fate due to columns being low, and so they all had to be replaced themselves. The bowl on this one had been practically obliterated so a new one was fitted after removal.

I've often heard it said that new Thorn designs often resemble items of footwear - I'll let you decide whether or not the Civic is one of these designs!

Having spent so much time on Station Rd, I'm very familiar with the Civic. Although this design is smaller than the Station Rd ones, the location of clips, screws etc are in the same place.

Being almost new, the outside lantern is very clean. The lamp area is apparently IP66 rated, and the gear area is IP65, so it should be clean inside. The frosting on the bowl could either be to diffuse the light going backwards or to hide the 'uninteresting' part of the lamp area.

Opening the bowl shows this area - notice how the lampholder can be moved up and down, as well as forwards and backwards. The Pilote's lampholder can also be adjusted in this way.

The lamp is powered by a single electronic gear unit.

The circuit board on the unit can be seen through a transparent panel.

The lantern was mounted to an AC Ford AC872 wall bracket on Tuesday, 9th August 2005. It was then wired up and switched on. I was surprised to see that the lamp actually started at a dim pink colour, and then gradually whitened as it warmed up.

I acquired a Civic 2 from Station Road on Thursday, 5th June 2008. Click here for more information.

Lantern warm-up video:

Urbis ZX3 | WRTL 2600

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