69CB. Herbert Street, Lyng, West Bromwich, Sandwell, West Midlands With thanks to Dwight for informing me of these Survivors. Installed on this short terraced street, in amongst the newer lighting columns, are two 15 ft (5 m) Stanton 10 columns, with long outreach F-type top-entry brackets, and Thorn Beta 5 lanterns, for 35 Watt SOX (low pressure sodium) lamps. Although these installations survived into July 2024, their time may be up soon, as two further Stanton columns on the adjacent Overend Street, which had been sleeved previously to bring their overall height to 6 m, and fitted with a Beta 2 and GEC Z9538 (both for 55 Watt SOX lamps), were now disconnected, awaiting removal, with new columns installed and operational alongside both.
The long outreach F-type bracket is unusual; presumably, it was specified on this road on account of the already-established trees - the usual shorter brackets would have prevented the lanterns from illuminating the carriageway.
No obvious spalling or other damage is present on this bracket.
Oddly, the lanterns are not fitted with photocell controls; instead, a miniature photocell is installed through the inspection door instead. Perhaps, the columns remained on time switch control, or maybe, the road was group-switched from a control point that has, subsequently, been removed, requiring the installation of photocells. The fact that they were not fitted into the lanterns is still surprising, however.
The second column is a little further down the road, on the opposite side.
This Beta 5 is in better condition than the first one is. A Philips-made SOX lamp is fitted; the fact that the franking is printed on the metal part of the cap, rather than stamped on the glass, shows that it is from one of the later batches, made just before Philips ceased SOX lamp production in 2019.
The tape visible on the bracket seems to be a way of indicating when the last re-lamp occurred, rather than being a means of trying to hold the bracket together.
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