Green Neon?? Now Wait A Minute!

I am very curious as to exactly what kind of gas mixture is used in these really tiny little green bulbs, but it ain't no neon! Or ain't it? Well, not entirely. Enjoy!
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[@simonmikkelsen]

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No! It's Fran. In the lab. Being franbulous.

[@rohanlg790]

Ayeeeeeeee

[@chrisa2735-h3z]

Dang right!

[@oliversmith9200]

@@rohanlg790 Fran told you that was high voltage, but, you had to touch it? ; )

[@Simonjose7258]

👏👏👐👋👋 Jazz Hands...

[@JingleJoe]

Frantastic.

[@lironmtnranch4765]

When I was a teen in the 80s, I made a stealth "night reader" with two orange and one green neon, so I could read in bed. IIRC it was a standard neon with green phosphor coating the inside of the glass. I seem to remember you could see orangey glow inside down the ends of the capsule. Possibly neon/argon mix to excite the green phosphor.

[@petejones1957]

I had the same green neon way way back, you could definitely see an orange glow inside when looking down at the top of the tube, which was about twice the size of your green ones Quite a novelty, long before the days of green LEDs

[@macthompson9750]

beautiful bulbs. i love that color green.

[@jeanjones7486]

I agree! Its FranLab at the bench! Live and enjoy u FRAN!

[@neville3151]

It's filled with a newly discovered gas named greeon.

[@moi01887]

Q: What do you call a neon lamp that's not lit up? A: Neoff.

[@oliversmith9200]

@@moi01887 And when on, it's called "pretty" because it actually is pretty. Not as pretty as I feel. After hanging with Fran, I feel prettier than a Russian red neon bulb, and that's pretty.

[@albertbatfinder5240]

I am not going to react to jokes involving neon or any other noble gas.

[@neville3151]

​@@albertbatfinder5240 Majestically funny (even though i had to google your comment).

[@kellyjackson7889]

@@albertbatfinder5240 Mendeleev was a brilliant person who had some peculiar habits. For instance, he ate off the floor for most meals, although periodically he had a table.

[@peterjameson321]

Thanks for a great video, Fran. I make tubes similar to this in my lab. For a green light the best phosphor is terbium doped gadolinium oxysulphide. Argon on its own will work with the phosphor but to get a good brightness you need to introduce a tiny amount of mercury as well. That brings the UVC level up and excites the phosphor better. The best carrier gas for use with mercury is a mix of 75% argon and 25% neon rather than argon alone and the pressure in the tube needs to be between 1 and 4 mm Hg. Regards, Peter

[@LowtechLLC]

Very low pressure mercury vapor. Like less than 0.001 atmosphere. Lower the pressure the closer the emission will only one spectral band at 253nm. That is uvc. The uv meter was only a and b. As another commented regular glass blocks uvc. And another commented try a spectrometer. If the pressure is around 1 atm mercury will have a faint blue line. Problem is the green will be too bright and make it hard to see the dim bands

[@kaylaandjimbryant8258]

That makes more sense than what I was thinking involving the krypton isotope used in some VR tubes (I forget which, but recall a half life in the vicinity of 30ish years). That isotope has a lot of UV as well.

[@martinh.3058]

Could also be an Argon mixture.

[@martinh.3058]

Thinking about it, what you are describing is basically a ccfl... So freezing them should make things a bit clearer since Hg vapour lamps should be affect more by low temperatures than pure noble gas fillings (Lower Brightness and higher striking voltage), if I'm not mistaken.

[@TMS5100]

> Could also be an Argon mixture. then the bulb would have been clear. they are obviously frosted inside with phosphor.

[@martinh.3058]

@@TMS5100 Argon also has a few UV lines so the usage of phosphor is not a sure sign for a Mercury vapor lamp. Also there were UV Arogon-Nitrogen Glow lamps www.lamptech.co.uk/Spec%20Sheets/D%20G%20Ar%20GE%20AR1.htm Besides that looking at the Paschen curve the Breakdown voltage of Hg vapor has a (~factor 10) higher value for small electrode spacings and low pressure filling than the one of an Argon filled tube.

[@MadScientist267]

News flash everyone... They've been making these for years. The legacy versions indeed use neon, you may have a hybrid there that's using a little mercury but even in the older bulbs the glow was very difficult to see because the green is so strong and usually could only make it out if there was an imperfection in the phosphor.

[@martinh.3058]

Yes I found a booklet from 1969 mentioning them using an Argon filling

[@c1ph3rpunk]

That color needs to be branded “Lightsaber Green”

[@geoffdeath2590]

the lamps makes me think of fallout 3 pip boy green

[@aidanfarley9566]

I have a few of these I found in a coffee maker. They were used as a substitute for colored LEDs and ran off standard 120v AC. Probably was used to make the circuit more simple without the need for a voltage regulator to drive LEDs.

[@toonvanderpas7604]

Another great episode Fran. With your broad knowledge you make these bulb and display topics so mighty interesting! And the end tune is very nice, I always listen it out completely. Thanks Fran!

[@compu85]

I have a Sony clock which uses these to illuminate the dial - well, it did until the lamps wore out. Good to know you found some, I’ll have to pick up a bag. I’d repaired the clock with green neons from Radio Shack, but they got dim after just a few months.

[@MVVblog]

Green neon bulb are & was very common, at least in Italy. I had tons of stuff with green, yellow, red, orange neon little bulb. I don't remember any blu neon.

[@selkywaters]

You just keep on giving! I didn't know why mercury was used in florescent lights until just now. You are so awesome!

[@robhunt-watts8908]

Hi Fran, love your stuff, just introduced you to my PhD daughter..She likes you too. Love from Salisbury Plain, England.

[@johnlorenz2855]

Not sure how I found your channel, but glad I did! Learning all the stuff I didn't think I needed to know! Keep u pom the great work!

[@DanHarkless_Halloween_YTPs_etc]

2:27 - Whoa, I thought I was the only one that made that funny little "arf" sound when shifting myself to grab something. I definitely didn't pick it up from Fran, either. Thanks for another great one, Fran. That "Ghostbusters green" from the "neon" really is gorgeous.

[@VEC7ORlt]

Fran - Bought some. Shows a full bag.

[@jamesmerritt5562]

I believe that Fran is, truly, much more intelligent than she lets on in her videos. She has already answered her own questions I am right next to her, waiting for the next video! Bring on the next Chinesium toy!

[@superotterboy7937]

That green glow is beautiful, dangerous or not! Haha! I may end up sourcing similar for teh sheer visual effect. Great video! I'm even more fascinating now!

[@flymypg]

If you could take active and passive spectra of the bulb, I would not be surprised if the glass itself were absorbing the UV and also fluorescing. The only glass I know of that would fluoresce green is Uranium-doped glass, but that would have an orange-ish color rather than the clear we see here. Shine an intense UV light on the bulb (may need to try a few frequencies to cover the band) and see what happens!

[@FranLab]

I did sniff the bag of bulbs with the Geiger counter and it has no emissions.

[@louistournas120]

@@FranLab That's a good idea, a thing to do with anything we buy.

[@mfbfreak]

Uranium glass is pale green. I got a few uranium glass tea cups. They fluoresce nicely when hit with UV :)

[@PracticalCat]

These have been around for decades. I have an air purifier from the early 90s with green neons. They also come in blue and white. Look on wiki they talk about the gases. There is also a picture of multiple colours.

[@TheSquaredM]

You misspelled color.

[@AndyFletcherX31]

@@TheSquaredM Colour is the correct "English" spelling.

[@DanielGBenesScienceShows]

I love these fun, little videos that focus on a single component. I’ve spent hours drooling directly into my Tektronix equipment out of pure geekdom. Oh, and the joy of having an HVAC stop filming or ruin a good take... hahaha! The pain is very real.

[@brentbarr498]

08:24 Never heard anyone get THAT excited about a light before... lol... super cute!! :)

[@TheSquaredM]

You do not understand the power of lights!

[@dablakh0l193]

Those are usually filled with a neon/argon mixture, the glass tube itself has a uv inhibitor and because they are low striking voltage, the neon/argon is most often the gas used there is enough energy to stimulate the green phosphor and the extra uv inhibitor in the glass or as an coating on the glass only allows the green light through. Unfortunately, depending on where they are made, if your uv meter doesn't read in the Uv-c band, then you could be getting a blast of Uv-c. There are some mini usb spectrometers on ebay. I bought one a while back and it is very good for determining chemical composition of light sources.

[@deanryckman7579]

You are such a badass, Not only for creating the "creampuff" the best fuzz pedal of all time, but for pumping out the most interesting breakdowns on youtube! a sincere thank you.

[@mikesradiorepair]

From Wikipedia: They can also be filled with argon, krypton, or xenon rather than neon, or mixed with it. While the electrical operating characteristics remain similar, these lamps light with a bluish glow (including some ultraviolet) rather than neon's characteristic reddish-orange glow. Ultraviolet radiation then can be used to excite a phosphor coating inside of the bulb and provide a wide range of various colors, including white.[29] A mixture of 95% neon, 2.5% krypton, and 2.5% argon can be used for a green glow,[30] but nevertheless "green neon" lamps are more commonly phosphor-based. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neon_lamp

[@chuckgenco]

Always interesting! and you have a very nice singing voice! Glad I waited until the end.

[@chrisa2735-h3z]

I agree I love her very unique voice☺️

[@MichiganPeatMoss]

Yes! Got a dozen or so of those back in the 90s - still have 3 or 4 left. Very similar. Probably from All Electronics in Van Nuys, CA.

[@argcargv]

Definitely a mix of gas that is producing UV light to activate the phosphors, but the glass envelope is probably doped to absorb most of the UV. I don't know what the gas mixture is but it seems to have a breakdown voltage that is similar to neon.

[@kaylaandjimbryant8258]

Neon is closer to 90V. The 60V is a dead giveaway that it isn't neon.

[@argcargv]

@@kaylaandjimbryant8258 Really? Not in my experience. I think you have it backwards. For reference see www.giangrandi.org/electronics/neon/neon.shtml where they measure not only neon (strike at about 70, maintain about 60v) whereas there is a higher strike voltage for the green "neon"s.

[@miguelburgueno4891]

Amazing, as usual with your videos. Btw, I love your curiosity and the mess in your workbench (...this is the real proof that "The Genius is ever doing SOMETHING..!"... ;) ) Kind regards, dear Fran..! :)

[@fivetriplezero8985]

Loved your song at the end. I have the same problem now that it is winter.

[@mikeselectricstuff]

My parents' freezer had a green neon like this maybe 45 years ago

[@FranLab]

How "cool"!

[@senilyDeluxe]

Mine too - also the Commodore 1701 monitor has one of them.

[@tekvax01]

I, like Mike, remember these green HV lamps from the 70s as well. You use to be able to purchase them at Radio Shack, in Ontario, Canada.

[@cambridgemart2075]

I pulled someting apart decades ago that had something like a dozen green neons in it, they were the NE2 size rather than these tiny ones.

[@eDoc2020]

@@cambridgemart2075 My family's old TV (from 1984) was like that. It had 14 stations you could preset. To change channel you press the corresponding latching button and a green neon lights up. The green shines through a sheet where you install digit sheets, so you get a nice sharp visual of the selected channel.

[@Ni5ei]

I'm surprized you talk about this like it's something new. As a little kid I had one of those night lights that are just an AC plug with a bulb and resistor in it and it was also green. That was 45 years ago.

[@ntsecrets]

Sony used these in the external clocks for betamax machines back in the late 70s. They slowly darken. I also saw them in Sony tvs for channel indicators.

[@nsfeliz7825]

yap my sony beta in the 80s did have green neon numbers .

[@mysock351C]

Used to see these green ones a lot in old surge suppressor power strips as the "protection" light for the MOV network, and goes out if any MOVs for fuses go. They usually just end up black, dark, and very dead from all the electrode sputtering, but one I took out of my RS/Tandy power strip to repair it still sort of worked. I like that green color they have.

[@MrSupro]

Under 100 volts will be tough to get argon to glow, but.... challenge accepted. Give me a week or two to set up an experiment. Depending on the age of them it could also be Kr 85. That ignites at pretty low voltage. Dont worry about the half life. Even if its 50 years old it would still have plenty of life left in it. Pale blue could very well be argon and Kr 85. Also you may be right about the glass filtering UV if it is Mercury. Additionally the lack of phosphor on the tip is more a matter of it would not survive the melting and seal off of the glass so why place it there.

[@randomhuman1965]

WE LOVE YOU, FRAN!!! Great ending song!!!!!!!!

[@SuperRahul73]

Used to have a bunch of them in my workshop. They were mainly used in mains testers (220v), pilot indicators, etc. With LEDs getting dirt cheap, these things disappeared from market. Eventually LEDs replaced these neons. Anyway what gas they had in them never struck my mind! 😁

[@colindejager1250]

Stand Back! - That's Kryptonite!

[@fredknox2781]

Only a problem if Fran is the alter ego for Supergirl.

[@justahilltopguy5418]

It's ok, Fran is a real superhero. Not one of those "Oh no! Not kryptonite again!" Superheroes. Fran will dissect it, find out its secrets, and post it for the world to see. She's kryptonite's kryptonite! Keep up the great work Fran! And many thanks.

[@justahilltopguy5418]

Love this comment, BTW.

[@df9969]

Electrolux vacuums had that same lite as a power indicator .in 1977 to 1979. They had a small resister to lwer the input voltage. I repurpused many to other projects.

[@neilbarnett3046]

When I sold components in the mid-'70s, we had chassis-mount red, amber and green neon bulbs. They all had an orange neon bulb inside and generally looked the same colour, it was only the colour of the housing that was different. I've probably got one or two "new old stock" in my loft. I used them as power-on indicators for the amplifiers I built around then.

[@BlooMule]

Back in the 70's during the CB radio craze, I would heat shrink these to my antenna tip and the RF energy would make them glow.

[@marcusfred4480]

Done a similar thing with a fluorescent tube from a torch taped to a 27MHz whip antenna on my car.

[@BG101UK]

It's when they start to glow when you're NOT transmitting when you need to worry!

[@BG101UK]

It's great to see these are available. I was trying to get hold of some for scale models I was making at the time but the only apparent source was pre-made indicators and switches. We didn't have the Internet back then, though ... These would be ideal for replacing worn-out indicator lamps in fridges and freezers, rather than replacing the entire lamp assembly, especially as the chance of finding one which fits is less than guaranteed.

[@joseph9770]

"A Full one twunty." -- Hello from Jersey, Fran. :->

[@FranLab]

Joyzee!

[@brucebaxter6923]

In the 80’s we used these in fridges to show they were on. We used to get two green and one red and put them in a plug top to check polarity of the wall sockets. I thought they had a slight neon glow but were swamped by the phosphor. I’m clearly wrong

[@davec6113]

My wife sings those same kind of little ditties like you did at the end. It's quite endearing.

[@gregorythomas333]

That is a really nice green color on that bulb...and the Russian neon is fantastic!!

[@SpydersByte]

right? Im typically not a fan of the color green but that's a lovely glow. Looks like the "radioactive" green you'd see on The Simpsons or something.

[@johnnodge4327]

Our recently purchased kettle has a blue neon, with the same matt coating on the glass. It's not bright, but a very rich blue colour. It seems coloured neons are popular.

[@tomhoehler3284]

Since neons only require a dropping resistor to operate from the mains, they are favorites with appliance manufacturers.

[@Elec-DIY]

I found one of those green neons on an old washing machine control panel. They have indeed a really nice green glow.

[@pcwcol]

You might try some freeze mist. If it contains mercury, it will not strike or will be very dim at low temperatures

[@tvsteve2]

Hello Fran I use some of them about 4 green and 4 orange neon thrown in a Drinking glass with one cup of water to test and demonstrate Microwave Ovens looks cool and shows evenness of coverage by moving it to corners etc.

[@stuartpeters1080]

Just this video, thanks Fran.

[@scottthomas6202]

Back in the day, I had some of those green " neon" bulbs that were the size of a standard NE-2 bulb. I think there were pale blue ones as well, but I never had any of them. Ordinary glass will block some ultraviolet, but not all. Those are cool little bulbs...

[@jonnymoka]

I could tell by your giggle when you where speaking of how pretty the light was, we both love lights:)

[@AdrianPardini]

I picked a handful of those from a broken tv when I was a teen. Thanks for the video!

[@20bluebug]

Very cool! I always wondered about these green "neon" lamps and what they really are.

[@boinkmaticgaming5835]

I bought green neons from radio shack like 40+ years ago and they were a bit longer than those ones. I hooked them up to our telephone line and when the phone rang they would pulse that beautiful green glow.

[@hollybrereton3140]

Crazy Girl ending singing to herself, I luv it, thats so me x

[@toddsprague9284]

I've been tempted to buy these a few years back, now you have inspired me to finally try them out. Thanks Fran!!! Your awsome!!

[@vyratron839]

I remember Radio Shack sold green neon bulbs and I think I got a few.

[@IgnusFast]

@@JohnSmith-eo5sp There are Radio Shack kiosks in some Hobby Town stores, believe it or not. I haven't checked it out, but I imagine it's just basic electronics supply now.

[@Starphot]

Green neon with phosphor was sold in the Radio Shacks in the 1970's and 1980's. It is neon gas in the tube that excites the phosphor by plasma. We had light cyan bar indicators on a test bench in the Navy. I took a magnifying glass and saw the orange neon glow around the cathode in its standby mode. I had one of those green neon bulbs on top of my bicycle CB antenna in the late 1970's during the CB craze. It does light up if the antenna is tuned properly. I did transceiver repairs as a career.

[@RetroCaptain]

Back in the late 80s I bought a couple green neon bulbs, the old ?2? Cm tall version. They lit up the same as yours. I used either one or both, as replacement for channel select light in 1985 Panasonic televisions. I'm positive that the o e ones were also green. Those micro neons are common as power indicator in Crock Pots Coffee Maker lighted toggles. They last about 1 year and go dark internally.

[@AdricM]

picked up a dozen of these and blue ones about 10 years back, they are the same dimensions and roughly current/voltage as a standard NE2 bulb. which most people are most familiar as the bulb that starts flickering in your older power strips, and coffemaker switches. the flickering is just that they have driven enough of the gas into the walls to need higher voltage to light. not sure about the gas mix, but they act just like neons, My dad would build Neon bulb capacitor ring oscillators. also he built a ring to pulse multiple the neons at a higher voltage to even them out so they would act more reliably at a given capacitor voltage.

[@wolfrobots118]

Your videos are addictive! I love when I see new videos from Fran in my suggested videos.

[@chrisingle5839]

Neon "GloLite" brand lamps were made just down the street from me here in Pauls Valley, OK. I managed to obtain a few papers from the old owner some years ago.

[@gordonpollard161]

Not sure if I'm repeating any of the previous comments, but... I've got once of these bulbs as well. I sparked it up using a tesla coil and measured the (visible) spectrum. Not much UV, a small peak in the blue at ~470nm and a wide peak in the green centred on 520nm. There was a series of really big peaks in the near IR at 827nm, and around 886nm, but the IR peaks might be due to the work up effects (that you see on fluorescent tubes). Interesting though.

[@jamest.5001]

I was half expecting kryptonite! Ha-ha, happy holidays!

[@PeterMilanovski]

I purchased both of the types that you have shown and possibly a different one also a few years back. I wanted to build a neon level meter but by the time they arrived in Australia which took over a month, I lost motivation for the project and they are still sitting around waiting to be used for something like just about anything else that I have purchased from eBay! The last time that I pulled them out was to test a neon bulb tester like the one that Big Clive took apart on his channel, I ended up getting distracted with how the tester was making little burn marks on my skin which I couldn't really feel but could see the spark and the remaining burn dot's! The neon bulbs went back into storage status and haven't seen the light since!

[@busted_keys]

It would be really interesting to build a relaxation oscillator with a normal neon and one of these to compare them and see if they sound any different? Or scope it to see if the sawtooth it generates is any different.

[@Rocco_v]

I have a bunch of those green ones I pulled from an early bulky VCR, they were used to light up the 13 VHF channels indicators on the front, so ya, they been around for a while. Mine are missing some phosphor coating on the bottom of each lamp so I can see the orange neon glow inside.

[@Phil.C1]

My farther worked on these many years ago. I remember finding a bag of samples that he kept. I always remember the blue ones to be the best. If I recall the coating was slightly radioactive, which allowed for the neons to operate in absolute darkness. In order for a neon lamp to glow you need a few photos to pass between the electrodes. Again this was a long time back but I think initially the color they emitted was a byproduct as they were ultimately wanting to use the neon as part of a high voltage relaxation oscillator. -But like may ideas at the time, the manufacturer saw a new market opportunity besides selling them to make oscillators. This was long before LEDs came about.

[@Askjerry]

My friend's grandfather had a neon sign shop... So I learned how to make neon signs. They used neon and argon. If you took a section of VOLTARC GREEN glass and filled ot with argon and a very tiny drop of mercury it was indeed green. If you instead filled it with only neon, you got a yellowish orange color. With only a handful of tubulation you could produce many colors. As your bulbs are very tiny, they are likely mercury vapor only. They are called "Neon Signs" because thst is what was used first... And for the layperson. We just said do you want red or blue "neon" because it was easier than explaining the different gasses. In the 70's and 80's some shops did exotic work also using xenon and/or helium.

[@edwatts9890]

I have purchased several lots of the green ones for a project, and one lot required over 200 VAC to strike the arc. They would remain lit (but dim) down to about 100 VAC.

[@theelmonk]

I've seen these phosphor-coated green bulbs since forever, usually in illuminated switches. They're not new. No idea what the gas is though. I'd agree it would be interesting to try to stimulate them externally though the glass may block it. If it's mercury vapor though I don't see that it would be any more dangerous than a conventional fluorescent lamp.

[@volvo09]

Yeah, i pulled a smaller one out of a miniatire coffee maker switch i think. I saved it because it was green phosphor, and tiiiiiny.

[@AnimationGoneWrong]

I think what may in there is a mix of mercury and neon, but the glass might contain uranium which would filter the normally blueish color down to green, which explains why there is no color difference when looking straight through the glass. Either that, or supposedly neon and argon together produce green. Not 100% sure though... only the manufacturer would really know.

[@FranLab]

The Geiger says no emissions.

[@cambridgemart2075]

Hit the glass with UV to see if it glows directly, if it's uranium glass it will fluoresce.

[@mfbfreak]

The glass doesn't have the color of uranium glass. Of the green indicator, neither glass nor phosphor fluoresces when hit with blacklight UV. The phosphor in the blue indicators does fluoresce.

[@repeatdefender6032]

i love that fast tremolo or vibrato your voice does. like Freddie Mercury. i have to train mine to do that but y’all just have it naturally, beautiful.

[@andymouse]

Interesting indicator...cheers...

[@hallpet45]

Orange rules,but green,hmmm...looks like Vannilty:ebay tubes...Go Fran,great stuff.BeSafe😷BeHappy😁.

[@Fwoxel]

I did watch right till the end :D

[@richtaylor6039]

Reminds me of Cal Mitcham testing the beads in his lab at the start of This Island Earth. Good vid.

[@xjet]

I wonder how many poor workers are being exposed to crippling levels of mercury poisoning making these things somewhere in the third world :-o

[@FranLab]

I was thinking the exact same thing.

[@michaelvarney.]

If one assumes that LCR's use 80 yo manufacturing techniques.

[@monad_tcp]

I just want an arc rectifier.

[@jerryg50]

The regular orange NE2 lamps do not have mercury. They are not like fluorescent tubes. Neon lamps use neon gas with some argon gas. The color ones would have a very small amount of mercury vapour in them. The workers are safe because there is no mercury put in to the air while the lamps are being made. All the gasses are sealed off.

[@tekvax01]

@@monad_tcp Mercury Rectifiers were widely used in building elevators system. They would rectify the incoming 440AC 3ph mains into 600 volts DC!! Scary things! Search KZbin, there are lots of examples of one in operation!

[@redoverdrivetheunstoppable4637]

i've salvaged some of those green ones from coffee machines, they don't last much apparently and start beeing dimmer quickly, the ones i found were like 4mm thick, extra small, they strike with an higher voltage compared to neons but not much higher, it can be a mixture

[@leonerduk]

8:55 I flinched away from the screen, thinking "Careful! don't touch that"

[@BobDarlington]

I have a wide variety of colored phosphor ne2 style build. Got them about 20 years ago and used a blue one in a tube amp build about 10 years ago.

[@Will_RM]

So many things these days are being replaced by LED's but they just can't do what incandescent, neon, and other older lighting can do/produce.

[@vaibhavhayaran]

Incandescent bulbs have this sort of natural warm feeling to them which makes them feel NOT artificial or same as sunlight... Maybe because those can generate nearly identical to the sun spectrum of light... And that's where LEDs and CFLs fail...

[@Will_RM]

@@vaibhavhayaran Exactly, I wish more people understood that, LED's can only produce a very narrow spectrum of light and color, and trys to mimic that of an incandescent full color spectrum of light, that the naked eye can't see but is there.

[@orestisgrivas5434]

@@vaibhavhayaran They indeed produce different spectrums. Not all white light is the same.

[@thelovertunisia]

Yes Leds dont have the charm and flair of discharge lamps. Discharge is alive like fire LED is dead solid.

[@goamarty]

@@vaibhavhayaran You would need to run the incandescent bulb at 6000 Kelvin to produce a spectrum like the sun Impossible, there is no material that melts above this temperature.So it is NOT 'nearly identical'. I am happy about LEDs, so we are not limited any more by the melting point of tungsten. I like 6000K white in some of my rooms. The only drawback of LEDs in mains voltage applications is their low operating voltage.

[@chrisa2735-h3z]

About vintage lightbulbs, I just put up my all incandescent Christmas icicle lights! #longliveincandecent

[@chrisa2735-h3z]

Rick Delair oooh those sound so beautiful!! I hope they serve you for many more years to come!!

[@JourneymanRandy]

Very good Fran. As always

[@christophermurdock6327]

I was surprised to find one like those as the power indicator for a Commodore 1702 monitor. I always thought it was an LED, but a green bulb!

[@featheredskeptic1301]

I've got one actual green neon from an old refrigerator. It's very dim, and you can see the orange glow inside the bulb. The green coating is exactly like those, just coated on the side the same way. Also, some of the Russian / USSR neons were made like regular flashlight bulbs, so they could be screwed into an indicator panel and not directly soldered in.

[@rarbiart]

Fran singing me do sleep! So wonderful!

[@PJHLR]

I used to offer green neon lamps as an optional replacement channel number indicator lamp versus the same old neon lamps on Zenith TVs in the early '90s. Never a dissatisfied customer.

[@brynnond.6952]

I’ve found green neon bulbs in old 120 volt power distribution strips back from the 80’s and 90’s

[@thomasheckhaus205]

Hey Fran, those look identical to the ready lights in old Honeywell potato masher strobes from the mid 70's.

[@ΣταύροςΑγγελόπουλος-ρ7θ]

Great job Fran. the following is fro Wikipedia: Neon indicator lamps are normally orange, and are frequently used with a colored filter over them to improve contrast and change their color to red or a redder orange. Phosphor-colored neon lamps They can also be filled with argon, krypton, or xenon rather than neon, or mixed with it. While the electrical operating characteristics remain similar, these lamps light with a bluish glow (including some ultraviolet) rather than neon's characteristic reddish-orange glow. Ultraviolet radiation then can be used to excite a phosphor coating inside of the bulb and provide a wide range of various colors, including white.[29] A mixture of 95% neon, 2.5% krypton, and 2.5% argon can be used for a green glow,[30] but nevertheless "green neon" lamps are more commonly phosphor-based.

[@SurajGrewal]

It's surprising to me that it was surprising for you to see a green neon. I have seen hundreds of them in India. Also...Blue neons exist but I've never seen those in person.

[@jamesmerritt5562]

I would question whether or not those were true "Neon", as the name suggests. I will go out on a limb and suggest they are not.

[@SurajGrewal]

@@jamesmerritt5562 Indeed....they might just be a variety of vacuum tubes

[@jamesmerritt5562]

@@SurajGrewal I guess all that matters is that they are pretty neat! I shouldn’t question them. I’d buy them; they look great!!

[@SurajGrewal]

@@jamesmerritt5562 the Chinese are still making them. Don't know why people are still buying neons in era of led and electro luminescence. Maybe it's folks like us who grew up with them.

[@jamesmerritt5562]

@@SurajGrewal it is for nostalgia, for sure.

[@robertmeyer4744]

years ago radio shack had NE2G green neon lamps. I got a small pack of assorted neon type lamps on eBay . they are clear but glow different colors. and the voltage is different for the color . I had one just like you got but larger and it lit Wight .

[@Team-fabulous]

Never mind neon bulbs Fran.... We demand some Christmas decorations in the Fran Lab... Ho ho ho...

[@seanbarr1343]

I'm so glad I got mine a couple of months ago, these are about to become unobtainium.

[@markschweter6371]

I still have some Sylvania phosphor Christmas lamps that my parents had from the late 40's or so. If I remember, blue, green, and purple. They're about the size of a tennis or raquet ball with a black base and candelabra screw.