UPDATE: **SOLD**
Randy spotted this one.
“WW2 Carbon Arc Anti-Aircraft Searchlight and Sperry Power Plant
Manufacture: Sperry Gyro Co.
Model: 1941A
This light has been restored by the Carroll Brothers who have 40 years experience in ground up restorations of vintage military equipment. Great care was taken to insure historical accuracy. This is a museum quality light.
The light has been restored to original condition. Light was completely disassembled and rebuilt. All lead base paint removed. Interior of drum repainted with heat resistant paint, exterior painted military green. Asbestos insulation removed and replaced with heat resistant insulation. Mirror is 85% to 95%.
Many NOS (new old stock) parts replace unusable parts;
New Sperry control box
New junction box with power receptacles
Reconditioned burner with good nose cone
Carriage has new tires and reconditioned hubs.
All old electrical wire has been removed and replaced with modern wire. Light rewired to 1940’s standards. Re-carboned light and azimuth light function. Meter and meter box restored and working well.
No broken glass, all data plates reconditioned and in place.
Sperry power plant has been fully restored as well.”
Hey! That’s my father-in-law’s light. I can answer all sorts of questions about this thing. It has my sweat and blood mixed in during the restoration, too.
These things are amazing. It burns two carbon rods, just like a rod welder. The rods are upwards of an inch thick.
I was born in Milwaukee in 1953. I remember seeing them frequently as a kid until the mid 1960’s maybe. At grand openings and carnivals and such to attract attention. Lots of times they had four or five running. Then I saw one in the early 70’s when I was smart enough to have a clue what was going on.
Seems the rods were 14 or 16 inches long? They sweep the sky automatically,right? Did they have to keep manually adjusting the gap?
Then years later I saw some new design colored high intensity light tubes of some sort. Never see anything like that that anymore. It seems like it would still be a good way to attract attention.
John
They have two rods, each a different length and diameter. The larger one is, I think, 24″. It has been a while since we lit them. Once you set the gap, it has a self-advancing mechanism. The burner is a wonderfully complex mess of gears and springs.
These big 60″ jobs were only made for a few years. We ended up with three of them to make the one good set. We tried converting one to an electric light, but the brightness just wasn’t strong enough. The manual says the arc is 1,000,000 (million) candlepower, and supposedly able to illuminate a target at thirty miles. We, however, couldn’t see the beam from about ten miles out. You have to focus the lens, a skill none of us mastered. That didn’t stop aircraft from trying to fly into the beam (bad idea, makes the FAA mad at us if we let them).
It does auto advance. This one is missing the parts for the proper setup, but the originals actually auto-tracked aircraft. We are missing the listening unit. The listening unit somehow (pure magic as far as I know) could identify aircraft and drive the rotation and azimuth of the light to spot without user intervention. It did this without microcontrollers or digital computers. I, being an IT guy, am very impressed by this.
Andrew
Correction on that candle power: 800,000,000.
Fascinating!
Is it stell for sale
Eric,
I haven’t seen it listed in a while. I’d guess it sold. I’ve updated the post.
It is still for sale. There isn’t really any status change since the ad was posted before. I think we just forgot to keep the listing going. My father-in-law isn’t really so hot with computers.
If you are interested, you can reach me at andrewcrisp556@hotmail.com. I can pass your information on to my father-in-law and his brother, who are the actual owners.
Awesome post. These arc lights fascinated me as a kid in the 60s-70s. Never knew they were built for WW2 and not for advertising. If I had the acreage I’d have tried to find one by now.
Hi Andrew, found this post by happenstance whilst doing research on the 1941A model searchlight and generator trailer. I am trying to gather research material to complete a 1/72 scale model of this and wondered if you had any more photographs, to allow me to build a scale model. If it was not too much of an imposition would you have any further photographs available to allow me to complete this project?
Thanking you in advance
Phillip Ptolomey
Hi Phillip, I’ll check the old files for pictures. We should still have all the photos from the restoration. Are you looking for both the generator and the light or just the light? I may be able to find the original manual and look for measurements for you, too.
If you send an email to me, I can forward the pictures to you once I find them. My address is andrewcrisp556@hotmail.com.
Hi Phillip,
I have pulled up some pictures from the restoration. I’ve tried to reply here a couple times, but it doesn’t seem to be working. I’m going to try this one more time…
Can you try emailing me at the address in one of my earlier posts? I suspect that my replies have been blocked because they may have looked like spam with an email address included.
Thanks,
Andrew
Hi Andrew,
Sorry I missed this email for approval. The system is less than perfect sometimes.
– Dave