General Electric Tantalum Light Bulb
date: label: date made
content: ca 1908
name: label: maker
content: General Electric Company
notes: label: Description (Brief)
content: General Electric tantalum filament lamp, ca 1908. Characteristics: brass medium-screw base with skirt and ceramic dome insulator. Drawn tantalum filament mounted on 11 upper, 10 lower molybdenum support hooks. Support hooks are set at 45 degree angle relative to the glass stem and provide tension to counteract filament sag during operation. Flat stem press with Siemens seal, right-angled leads. cotton lead insulator. Filament connectors are multi-part: the filament ends are crimped onto a sort piece of wire which is soldered onto the end of the wire leading into the press and the Siemens seal. Tipped, S-shaped glass envelope with taper above base skirt. Paper label on skirt: "[GE logo] | Tantalum | W V" (ratings section is missing).
label: Description (Brief)
content: The element tantalum was used as a lamp filament during the first decade of the twentieth century. Although somewhat more energy efficient than carbon filaments common at that time, tantalum filaments did not work well with alternating current. They were phased out in the early 1910s when manufacturers introduced lamps made with tungsten filaments.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Electricity
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: from General Electric Company
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: EM.239146
label: catalog number
content: 239146
label: accession number
content: 46578
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Light Bulb
label: Object Name
content: incandescent lamp
label: Object Type
content: Lighting Devices
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 14 cm x 6 cm; 5 1/2 in x 2 3/8 in