The History of Creation of Conveyable Lighting Tower
Who invented the 1st portable lighting tower?
This depends mostly on your definition of a lighting tower. A broad definition could include something as straightforward as a candle or primitive torch placed on a tall mast to cast light over an enormous area, such a device has doubtless been used since the Stone Age.
In more current history it’s un-clear as to when the modern lighting tower was invented. Researching patent applications reveals that machines not dissimilar to today’s lighting towers were being designed in the 1930s.
A patent from 1932 shows what could be the 1st machine of its kind filed in US patent 1934576 and is named as a transportable floodlighting unit for airports.
The patent describes a chassis with 4 wheels at each corner ( allowing the machine to be towed ), a generator powered by an engine and one large electrical lamp at each end of the car. The machine is designed to be used to provide on-demand lighting of alternative landing sites at airports on occasions when the main landing areas are out of use because of inclement weather conditions.
More lately in 1980 a US patent 4181929 was filed for a Portable illuminating tower that illustrates a much nearer similarity to modern day lighting towers.
The US patent 4181929 describes a conveyable lighting tower composed from a base frame ( which contains an engine and generator ) and a vertical, extending, hydraulic mast with 2 electrical lamps at the upper end. The unit does not permit towing but instead is light and compact enough to be simply transported. The design also includes jack legs that are now common place on all lighting towers to ensure stability in gusty winds.
This is kind of a serious development in the history of the lighting tower as this patent largely forms the basis of most modern day lighting towers which contain similar elements like a base that stores the engine and generator along with an extending hydraulic mast that supports the luminaries.
The following patent was filed later on in the same year of 1980 but was for an answer to provide more intensive illumination. The US patent 4220981 describes a framework with 4 wheels to hold the generator and engine and two folding telescopic masts at opposite corners of the framework that each hold a cluster of electrical lamps. The design also allows for the masts to be rotated enabling finer control over the area of illumination. By offering 2 masts the light tower also allows for illumination over virtually all sides of the machine. This is unlike prior light towers which often offer illumination on only one side of the machine.
Since 1980 considerable progress has been manufactured by lighting tower manufacturers. Though the final design has varied tiny from those seen in the 1980s many enhancements have been made to make lighting towers simpler to use and more environmentally friendly.
The Hylite lighting tower from Taylor Construction Plant includes Adjustabeam technology which permits the user to adjust the direction of each lamp from the ground. The TCP Hylite also has a flexible frame design which allows just about any generator to be used to power the light heads.
The TCP Ecolite lighting tower has also broken new ground by utilising extremely cheap lamps to reduce fuel consumption dramatically, which is particularly timely seeing as global warming is becoming a more and more prevalent concern.
There’s a lot of information on this topic online, so you can get more of it if you want, and you can watch southland season 2 episode 1 or parks and recreation season 2 episode 17 meantime.
Tags: lighting, lighting tower