Melting flash bulbs

[cameracrack]

<p>So I was given some flashbulbs (thanks again Mark). I whipped out my Signet 50 and popped one in. I took my first picture using a flashbulb ever! It was kool, my family and I were all wowed.<br>

<br /> When I took the picture, I looked at the bulb and it has cracked and melted all the way around but still intact. So I was wondering if that's normal. I figured that I would be able to take more than one picture with a bulb but I suppose that it happens because of their age?</p>

 

[todd peach seattle, washi]

<p>A flashbulb is a single-shot device. It's like a little firecracker / incendiary thingy. It goes "poof" once and it's done.</p>

<p>Some were prone to cracking and sending shards out. Plastic coating on the bulbs controlled that (so the shards wouldn't hit the subject). Some flash guns had little shields over the dome to stop any fragments from getting away.</p>

 

[ken_jeanette1]

<p>That is the normal way flash bulbs fire. You only get one flach per flash bulb. I believe the melted part you see is a plastic coating on the glass bulb, which protects from shattering because the high energy burn of the filament could cause the glass to shatter, and even explode in some cases.</p>

[vick_vickery]

<p>OK...I'm gonna show my age here!</p>

<p>First, the melted look is perfectly normal and you do get only one shot per bulb...thats why in the '50's you saw all of us photogs running around with buldging coat pockets! Google up some old pictures of press photographers at work with their Graphics and you'll see what I mean!</p>

<p>The bulbs are coated in plastic so they wouldn't shatter and sent glass flying everywhere...which they still did anyway every once in a while just to keep us on our toes! Nearly cut a friendly pharmacist to pieces taking his picture in his store one day...lucky he didn't sue me, but folks weren't so lawsuit prone in 1954!</p>

<p>Free tip: when using flashbulbs, lick the back/bottom of the bulbs base (the contact point that goes into the flashgun) before inserting the bulb into the flashgun to get better electrical contact and more reliable flash. It actually works. Alot of us ran around alot with burnt finger tips in those days, too...sometimes the bulbs go bang as soon as you insert them into the flashgun!</p>

<p> </p>

[JDMvW]

<p>ditto.</p>

<p>To prevent burns, dedicated flash shooters often wore a light glove on one hand to prevent burns when rapidly replacing bulbs in a shoot, and most particularly for cases of premature "detonation." It still was safer than using flash powder in a tray.<br /> :)</p>

[bsharpe411]

<p>I'm old enough to remember the motto for Sylvania flashbulbs..."Blue dot - for sure shot".</p>

<p>I use to crack the glass inside the plastic covering and use the spent bulbs as little maracas. I was easily amused back then.</p>

[brucecahn]

<p>Flashbulbs were used to get married back when. Stomp on one under the right circumstances, and you were hitched.</p>

[conrad_hoffman]

<p>No doubt they cost a fortune today if you can even find them, but way back it was entertaining to put a big screw base flashbulb in a lamp and wait for some innocent victim to come along and turn it on.</p>

[silverscape]

hehe...I'm younger than you guys, but believe it or not I actually HAVE used flash bulbs before. I distinctly remember I had an old Kodak point-and-shoot camera when I was a little kid in the mid-1980's. I think it was an Instamatic or something like that. It was a really old camera even then. My parents had probably bought it for me from a thrift shop or antique shop, just as a toy to play with. But I actually did take pictures with it, and I even clearly remember the 126 film catriges it used. Anyway, I also remember that it took flash cubes or what I think were called "magic cubes." You snapped the cube in and when you used the flash, it would pop and burn the bulb. You would only get one shot. I seem to remember that you could get 3 flashes from 1 cube...it must have had 3 bulbs and the cube would turn each time you took a picture. I don't remember anything about the camera, other than it was some kind of little Kodak camera, and it used 126 film and flash cubes. It was the first camera I ever owned. It was really old, but hey when you're 8 years old you don't really care. I was just excited to have my own camera. Actually, I'm convinced that little camera is what eventually got me interested in photography, and especially antique cameras.

 

 

I actually have a bunch of flash bulbs and a flash, which came with one of the antique cameras I've bought on eBay. I'm still afraid to actually try to use it. I'm afraid the bulbs are going to blow up or something! The funny thing is that I wasn't afraid of flash cubes when I was 8 years old...yet flash bulbs scare me now. But now that I fixed my Argus C3, maybe I'll finally try it. I posted a question about flash bulbs a while back...maybe a year or so ago.

[frank.schifano]

<blockquote>

<p>I use to crack the glass inside the plastic covering and use the spent bulbs as little maracas. I was easily amused back then.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>You did that too? Hmmm...</p>

[cameracrack]

<p>Thanks for the info and all the stories!<br /> My husband and I were so shocked that it melted we took video that I took a photo of the Christmas tree while using a flashbulb.<br>

They are a bit costly when I come across them on ebay. I'll have to be pickier about when I use them.</p>

<p> </p>

[User_502260]

<p>The summer crew in the film department at Camera Barn was made up mostly of college students. We would take the battery out of a Polaroid SX-70 film pack and use paper clips to run the current into flashbulbs. This kept us busy during the slow hours. </p>

[User_502260]

<p>The summer crew in the film department at Camera Barn was made up mostly of college students. We would take the battery out of a Polaroid SX-70 film pack and use paper clips to run the current into flashbulbs. This kept us busy during the slow hours. </p>

[lamar_larsen]

<p>Hey you guys DON'T lick the flashbulbs bottom contacts.<br>

They are lead soldered. You know lead poison!</p>

[kelly_flanigan1]

<p>Having a #50 go off in ones hands is abit more risky than the lead! :)</p>

[vick_vickery]

<p>I licked many a bulb base and I'm still around! Er...sometimes I don't think so good, though! :-)</p>

[the celt 2]

<p>Conrad, when I was in the USAF as a photographer, and lab tech, we would always get the "new guy" by screwing in one of those big mothers into the safe lites in the printing room. Then we would send him in to "carefully" check each lamp woth out the filter to make sure they were all working. Always good for a laugh. </p>

[Lou_Meluso]

<p>Liana, yet one more tip: Make sure the flash gun, either hot shoe or pc cord is already conected to the camera before loading a bulb. I made the mistake once of loading the bulb before hand and as I loaded the flash gun onto the hot shoe I had difficulty getting it aligned. Not having great eyesight, I brought the camera closer to my face to see the mount better and finally wiggled the gun onto the shoe. The moment the gun hit the shoe contact...POOF...the bulb went off..about 8 inches from my face. The blinding flash was bad enough but the intense heat scared the bejesus out me.</p>

[ben_hutcherson]

<p>If you're interested in using flashbulbs, keep your eyes open at antique stores and flea markets.</p>

<p>I have quite a stash of them, mostly #5s/P25s. I don't think that I've ever paid more than $6 for a full dozen. I can often get a full or partial dozen for $2-3. I've also bought camera bags for a few dollars that were stuffed full of them.</p>

<p>A few years ago, I picked up a half dozen big ones with the standard household screw base. I think the whole bunch was about $4.</p>

<p>They're out there if you watch for them.</p>

[Mike Gammill]

<p>I remember my dad using flashbulbs with his Crown Graphic to photograph weddings. When he started using a Mamiya C33 (and later Mamiya Super Press 23) he went to Matador electronic flash units.<br>

I owned a couple of flashcube cameras. In school we would take used AG-1 bulbs and fill them with dusty soil and throw them at unsuspecting classmates (outdoors, of course).<br>

Still have a few M3 flashbulbs around somewhere: clear for tungsten film, and blue for daylight film</p>

[david_barts2]

<blockquote>

<p>No doubt they cost a fortune today if you can even find them, but way back it was entertaining to put a big screw base flashbulb in a lamp and wait for some innocent victim to come along and turn it on.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I remember playing that particular joke on one of my sisters many years ago. Somehow, she knew exactly who to blame for doing it. :-)</p>

[jeff_livacich]

<p>The flashbulbs have metal wool or foil inside and it vaporises upon flashing. The ones the size of incandescent light bulbs with the same screw base were indeed much fun to screw into standard lamps as a prank, though expensive fun it was. Man, those things could kick out the light. I have great admiration for the abilities of the photographers of another era who could light whole interiors and make it look like the shot was made with ambient illumination.</p>

<p>People in high school were impressed when one of my flash bulbs would shatter upon flashing and bits of glass would make tinkly sounds as they hit the floor. When changing snap-in bulbs I'd pop a bulb into mid-air, catching it and dropping it into a pocket while ignoring the pain, and popping in another bulb, all in one semi-continuous motion. I told people I popped them into the air to let them cool off before I touched them, but the real reason was it made me look like a cool photographer type.<br>

<br /> Chris, there were both Flashcubes and Magicubes. Flashcubes used batteries, while with Magicubes the camera would poke a little lever into an opening on the bottom of the Magicube, releasing a spring, which would strike something. I guess it was some sort of piezoelectric thing.<br>

<br /> The cubes were pretty cool. They would rotate to a fresh bulb after flashing-pretty high tech for the simple Instamatics and such they were mounted to. The flashbars like on Polaroid cameras just never had the same panache.</p>