I'm in support of buying the machinery, but how it would be pulled off is whats making me skeptical....however I know of places around here that'd be perfect for use as factories likely cheaper to (lots of old warehouses around here), and if the project actually gets going i could start trickling money towards it once i get a job.

Ok to answer the economically feasible question, what philips decides is feasible is not what others will, Philips has shareholders and they tend to like the following things, dividends on shares, they also like to see continued growth, the factory may very likely be making money, and in reality it is making money or they would of shut it down long ago, but with the increase in the LED sector and the rapid growth in this sector, which equals much higher profits and this makes shareholders happy, honestly most share holders don't even know what they are investing in nor do they care, the only thing is the numbers at the end of the year, and if they don't see the growth they pull the investment, and that affects all of philips not just the hamilton plant so they are protecting there core product line up and they will drop the rest one by one even if they are profitable...

If you read there financials you will see LED's and >2 billion of them being delivered are a major targets and they don't want anything getting the way of that so it's more then profits in one factory or one product line it's the whole direction they are headed to sustain high profit levels, and they know there is 1.1 Billion people without access to electric lighting at night so they plan to sell those 1.1 billion people LED lights (And don't think they are doing more then needed to look good they only donated 190,000 euros in lighting to humanitarian needs and they still made 369,000,000.00)   

Ok to answer the economically feasible question, what philips decides is feasible is not what others will, Philips has shareholders and they tend to like the following things, dividends on shares, they also like to see continued growth, the factory may very likely be making money, and in reality it is making money or they would of shut it down long ago, but with the increase in the LED sector and the rapid growth in this sector, which equals much higher profits and this makes shareholders happy, honestly most share holders don't even know what they are investing in nor do they care, the only thing is the numbers at the end of the year, and if they don't see the growth they pull the investment, and that affects all of philips not just the hamilton plant so they are protecting there core product line up and they will drop the rest one by one even if they are profitable...

If you read there financials you will see LED's and >2 billion of them being delivered are a major targets and they don't want anything getting the way of that so it's more then profits in one factory or one product line it's the whole direction they are headed to sustain high profit levels, and they know there is 1.1 Billion people without access to electric lighting at night so they plan to sell those 1.1 billion people LED lights (And don't think they are doing more then needed to look good they only donated 190,000 euros in lighting to humanitarian needs and they still made 369,000,000.00)   

But the fact is that LPS us going to dissappear. The demand is declining and investing such technology is questinable in moneymaking wise. As the production number gets smaller the unit price will get higher as fixed costs will still remain same. Higher price futher reduces demand as it makes other choices more tempting.

Also Philips as big corporation has ready world wide distribution networks so it's really easy for them to get the product everywhere in the world with reasonable cost. This would be one of those things that should be carefully thought thru if it would be considered setious business opportunity.

 

But the fact is that LPS us going to dissappear. The demand is declining and investing such technology is questinable in moneymaking wise. As the production number gets smaller the unit price will get higher as fixed costs will still remain same. Higher price futher reduces demand as it makes other choices more tempting.

Also Philips as big corporation has ready world wide distribution networks so it's really easy for them to get the product everywhere in the world with reasonable cost. This would be one of those things that should be carefully thought thru if it would be considered setious business opportunity.

 

And then there was this Impossible Project yet here it is in full production and now at the same price and better quality, and lots of other people said it can't be done...

And then there was this Impossible Project yet here it is in full production and now at the same price and better quality, and lots of other people said it can't be done...

Totally different user- and product-category.

Industrial & public use lamp with no consumer demand vs instant film which rides with nostalgia and hipsters and with no much professional use.

As a business, these two cant be compared.

SOX does in fact ride with nostalgia to some people in the UK (no, not light collectors but just ordinary people who like the light). Offering it complete with a suitable luminaire as a porch light may be an example application. Expensive "steampunk" luminaires with carbon-replica GLS (and Yellowish <2200K light) go well, so why SOX not ?

SOX is very energy efficient, so it might have a niche in the commercial/industrial sector (back alleys of buildings where CRI does not matter, but safety and energy use does). The 18W SOX alone with a G24d-3 base and internal electronic starter, can be used interchangebly with a 26W PL-C/PL-T (they use the same ballast anyway), provoding a "much more light, no gear change" retrofit option for e.g. 26W PL-C wallpacks

SOX light is excellent in going through fog, so this might be another niche for users in places where dense fog is a problem



It have sufficient advantages to find a niche where it would go well. And that is exactly where it could live on if not on the roads

[...]they also like to see continued growth, the factory may very likely be making money, and in reality it is making money or they would of shut it down long ago[...]

I see that you are not familiar with their "golden tail" strategy, which they have been following since the early 2010s. To keep things simple, it goes as follows: in order to implement a smooth transition from conventional technology to solid-state lighting while maintaining their #1 position in the market (a very tough proposition given the huge albatross hanging on their neck that their established industrial footprint is/was), they decided to end all R&D in standard lighting technologies (there wasn't much to be done anyway) and let the production run for as long as possible (i.e. as long as the business units are profitable) while applying value-engineering changes to the (still) most popular existing products whenever possible.

The goals were/are: a) that any profits (however small) from the standard lamp factories are used to fund the transition and growth in the SSL market, and b) to literally become the last man standing in the conventional lighting market in order to capture all (or most) of the remaining customers using old tech. If the sales of a certain product class were to decrease too fast and result in dire forecasts in terms of profitability, then the business unit would be sold off while there was still time and interest. The same goes for departments and specialized factories dealing with components that could eventually be sourced out. So, the point was not to maximize profits when it came to conventional technologies, but to milk it out as much as possible. In this context, growth is irrelevant when it comes to classical lamps as their decline in the present lighting market is the only thing that's going on - it is expected that by 2025 their market share will have shrunk by 90%! and so far, the market has evolved more quickly than forecasted.

So, if they planned the closure of Hamilton for 2020, with all the extra costs that this entails (i.e. social plan and cleaning up of the factory ground), you can then be really certain that they had no other choice, that the commercial life of SOX lamps has truly run out of steam, and that profitability is no longer possible in the short term while there's nobody (with a strong financial back, that is) interested in this particular business. Otherwise they would have found a way to sell off this particular business unit, and they really are good at it.

Expensive "steampunk" luminaires with carbon-replica GLS (and Yellowish <2200K light) go well, so why SOX not ?

One reason is that the "carbon filament" and "squirrel cage filament" configurations in GLS lamps are instantly recognized by the general public as the typical "old incandescent lighting" with all the nostalgia associated to it, hence their willingness to pay a higher price for so-called vintage lamps and luminaires. That is also part of the reason for the success and widespread acceptance of LED filaments lamps (even within the LG community!).

Such familiarity and nostalgia in the general public does not even remotely apply to SOX lamps, which is more associated with streetlighting (for the very few who actually cared to get interested in this particular subject matter) than with anything else. Show a LPS lamp to anybody and you'll get a puzzled look more often than not. Besides, there's no comparison between the warm comfy glow emitted by carbon filament lamps and the monochromatic yellow light given off by low-pressure sodium.

It have sufficient advantages to find a niche where it would go well. And that is exactly where it could live on if not on the roads

Except for one thing: LED technology is still very young (less than two decades old for lighting-grade diodes, vs. 85 years for LPS), and will evolve even further in the coming years. At the present time the most efficient LEDs are of the cool-white phosphored kind, but developments in the semi-conductor chip technology will result in efficient phosphor-less diodes while the so-called green-gap in efficiency will be eventually solved in the coming decade or so.

What this means is that LED systems will not only improve further in efficacy, even more efficient colored-light units will be developed precisely for applications where CRI is of a lesser importance (security, industrial, road, yard, tunnel lighting etc). Today, there already are phosphor-less white LEDs available, although these are not yet as efficient as their fluorescent counterparts, and in Europe there already are some non-white streetlight LED luminaires in use, optimized for maximized efficiency instead of color quality (however, some of them are designed to prevent wildlife from being disturbed at night, but that's a minority case). The 18 W SOX has an efficacy of only 100 lm/W, which is now a level below that of most LED systems (even the cheap LED filament lamps are much more efficient!) and it is certain that nearly-monochromatic amber diodes will soon surpass this level too, if this is not already the case. So the niche application you mentioned (i.e. for security lighting in foggy areas) is not even safe for SOX lamps in the long run.

SOX does in fact ride with nostalgia to some people in the UK (no, not light collectors but just ordinary people who like the light). Offering it complete with a suitable luminaire as a porch light may be an example application. Expensive "steampunk" luminaires with carbon-replica GLS (and Yellowish <2200K light) go well, so why SOX not ?

SOX is very energy efficient, so it might have a niche in the commercial/industrial sector (back alleys of buildings where CRI does not matter, but safety and energy use does). The 18W SOX alone with a G24d-3 base and internal electronic starter, can be used interchangebly with a 26W PL-C/PL-T (they use the same ballast anyway), provoding a "much more light, no gear change" retrofit option for e.g. 26W PL-C wallpacks

SOX light is excellent in going through fog, so this might be another niche for users in places where dense fog is a problem



It have sufficient advantages to find a niche where it would go well. And that is exactly where it could live on if not on the roads

The difference is that modern carbon filament replica can be used at almost any fixture and table lamp designed for incandescent while lps needs it own special control gear and it's not suitable for decoration purpose at indoors.

And beside, isn't it that those modern carbon filament lamps just have very inefficient standart filament and not real carbon filament?

Also, that retrofit lamp idea is just sheer craziness. Too many problems with no much improvement compared to original. Internal electronic starter would need lot's of R&D, manufacturing becomes more complicated, new shape/size outter bulb, 18w sox is much heavier and bigger than pl-c/t -> would most likely need additional support, burning position restriction of sox lamps vs none in fluorescent and incompatibility with electronic ballast. These are atleast the ones that came my mind first. I just dont see business opportunity here.

I see that you are not familiar with Philip's "golden tail" strategy, which they follow since the early 2010s (if I remember correctly, having been there when this happened). To keep things simple, it goes as follows: in order to implement a smooth transition from conventional technology to solid-state lighting while maintaining their #1 position in the market (a very tough proposition given the huge albatross hanging on their neck that their established industrial footprint is/was), they decided to cut all R&D investments in standard lighting technologies and let the production run for as long as possible (i.e. as long as the business units are profitable) while applying value-engineering changes to the (still) most popular existing products whenever possible.

The goals were/are: a) that any profits (however small) from the standard lamp factories are used to fund the transition and growth in the SSL market, and b) to literally become the last man standing in the conventional lighting market in order to capture all (or most) of the remaining customers using old tech. If the sales of a certain product class were to decrease too fast and result in dire forecasts in terms of profitability, then the business unit would be sold off while there was still time and interest. The same goes for departments and specialized factories dealing with components that could eventually be sourced out. So, the point was not to maximize profits when it came to conventional technologies, but to milk it out as much as possible. In this context, growth is irrelevant when it comes to classical lamps as their decline in the present lighting market is the only thing that's going on (it is expected that by 2025 their market share will have shrunk by 90%!).

So, if they planned the closure of Hamilton for 2020, you can then be really certain that the commercial life of SOX lamps has truly run out of steam, and profitability is no longer possible in the short term and there's nobody (with a strong financial back, that is) interested in this business. Otherwise they would have found a way to sell off this particular business unit.
One reason is that the "carbon filament" and "squirrel cage filament" configurations in GLS lamps are instantly recognized by the general public as the typical "old incandescent lighting" with all the nostalgia associated to it. That is also part of the reason for the success and widespread acceptance of LED filaments lamps (even within the LG community!).

Such familiarity and nostalgia does even remotely apply to SOX lamps, which is more associated with streetlighting (for the very few who actually cared to get interested in this particular subject matter) than with anything else. Show a LPS lamp to anybody and you'll get a puzzled look more often than not. Besides, there's no comparison between the warm comfy glow emitted by carbon filament lamps and the monochromatic yellow light given off by low-pressure sodium.
Except for one thing: LED technology is still very young (less than two decades old for lighting-grade diodes, vs. 85 years for LPS), and will evolve in the coming years. At the present moment the most efficient LEDs are of the cool-white phosphored kind, but developments in the semi-conductor chip tehcnology will result in efficient phosphor-less diodes while the so-called green-gap in efficiency will be eventually solved in the coming decade or so.

What this means is that LED systems will not only improve further in efficacy, even more efficient colored-light units will be developed precisely for applications where CRI is of a lesser importance (security, industrial, road, yard, tunnel lighting etc). Today, there already are phosphor-less white LEDs available, although these are not yet as efficient as their fluorescent counterparts, and in Europe there already are some non-white streetlight LED luminaires in use, optimized for maximized efficiency instead of color quality. The 18 W SOX has an efficacy of only 100 lm/W, which is now a level below that of most LED systems and it is certain that nearly-monochromatic amber diodes will soon surpass this level if this is not already the case. So the niche application you mentioned (i.e. for security lighting in foggy areas) is not even safe for SOX lamps in the long run.

That's quite clever strategy, I can see why Philips is doing considerably well.

The special design stuff is sold as a set, luminaire with lamp. As such, every arrangement can be done between the internal components. For GLS there are none, but for the SOX, a ballast is called for

It may be a good design choice to standardize on the G24d-3 base instead of the old By22d, atleast for 18W. Making the luminaire accept both SOX (18W) and PL-T (26W) lamps, means that the user who bought the luminaire have choice between SOX and excellent quality White light (with good energy efficiency too) at any time, making the related luminaire a more attractive choice since it won't be limited only to the SOX lamp



The SOX light is not warm, but is unique, bold, and it stands out over anything 2500..3000K "Warm White". There always are the people who like what is bold and stands out, and it can be attempted to appeal to them. Another group is who liked the SOX lighting on the streets (even without knowing the technology, liked the light), and might see it fit for their porch light or surrounding their business, when the street goes LED

For the 18W/26W lamp, the built in electronic starter does not need any new design over existing 500V..1kV starters as were used in SOX streetlights, or over electronic Fluorescent starters (that are already as compact as fitting inside a Fluorescent starter case, and would fit just as well in the G24d-3 starter compartment. The preheating time is unneeded for SOX, but that can be eliminated with a single component change)

The lamp can also be made as a 4 pin lamp (with 2 pairs of jumpered pins), compatible with electronic ballasts



The modern carbon filament is a Tungsten filament, the lamps range around 2..5 Lm/W vs. 10..16 Lm/W for standard GLS. Many of the lamps with the wackier looking filament arrangement have manual labor involved in the making



How business-viable it might be, both as a utilitarian application and as a fancy-design lamp ? We are back to the very first questions, what are the costs and sizes involved. If we take 2 extreme conditions :

 - Everything is given for free and a sufficient subset of the equipment can be chosen to maintain small volume production, then it is absolutely worth a shot (why not ?)

 - Its all so expensive that there is no way in the world to even start it



So far, nothing prevents us from coming up with possibilities of what to do with it, obtaining information from Philips (and from Ledvance, in regards to the other lamp plant Max mentioned) as if we are sure we want to do it, looking for possible arrangements. We aren't yet at the point where we gotta make the decision to draw the money out

At this stage, none of the planning and information acquiring costs anything, and is in fact much more interesting to do vs. to argue over 7 pages with nay sayers...

The special design stuff is sold as a set, luminaire with lamp. As such, every arrangement can be done between the internal components. For GLS there are none, but for the SOX, a ballast is called for

It may be a good design choice to standardize on the G24d-3 base instead of the old By22d, atleast for 18W. Making the luminaire accept both SOX (18W) and PL-T (26W) lamps, means that the user who bought the luminaire have choice between SOX and excellent quality White light (with good energy efficiency too) at any time, making the related luminaire a more attractive choice since it won't be limited only to the SOX lamp



The SOX light is not warm, but is unique, bold, and it stands out over anything 2500..3000K "Warm White". There always are the people who like what is bold and stands out, and it can be attempted to appeal to them. Another group is who liked the SOX lighting on the streets (even without knowing the technology, liked the light), and might see it fit for their porch light or surrounding their business, when the street goes LED

For the 18W/26W lamp, the built in electronic starter does not need any new design over existing 500V..1kV starters as were used in SOX streetlights, or over electronic Fluorescent starters (that are already as compact as fitting inside a Fluorescent starter case, and would fit just as well in the G24d-3 starter compartment. The preheating time is unneeded for SOX, but that can be eliminated with a single component change)

The lamp can also be made as a 4 pin lamp (with 2 pairs of jumpered pins), compatible with electronic ballasts



The modern carbon filament is a Tungsten filament, the lamps range around 2..5 Lm/W vs. 10..16 Lm/W for standard GLS. Many of the lamps with the wackier looking filament arrangement have manual labor involved in the making



How business-viable it might be, both as a utilitarian application and as a fancy-design lamp ? We are back to the very first questions, what are the costs and sizes involved. If we take 2 extreme conditions :

 - Everything is given for free and a sufficient subset of the equipment can be chosen to maintain small volume production, then it is absolutely worth a shot (why not ?)

 - Its all so expensive that there is no way in the world to even start it



So far, nothing prevents us from coming up with possibilities of what to do with it, obtaining information from Philips (and from Ledvance, in regards to the other lamp plant Max mentioned) as if we are sure we want to do it, looking for possible arrangements. We aren't yet at the point where we gotta make the decision to draw the money out

At this stage, none of the planning and information acquiring costs anything, and is in fact much more interesting to do vs. to argue over 7 pages with nay sayers...

Still far too complicated (and therefore expensive). The design work and money needed for all this without even taking account the buying of the machinery is quite high. We would need to have the production of the fixture outsourced. New base for the sox lamp would mean modification for the equiptments and possibly more expenses.

What comes to possible change in starter, removing that one component coulb be expensive if the ordered batch is small, and then it would be special unstandart part ie. Nightmare to find replacement for the owners.

The end product would have to be inspected to get all the necessary approval so that we are able to sell it. This being highly unstandart thing, this might be a problem.

There may be people who like that yellow light of sox, but why would they buy many times more expensive thing when they can get the same results using something like led?

The machinery, place, transport, source materials cost money, but it is yet an open question how much money and whether they can be arranged for less money. We can't progress with answering this question before acquring more information

The trial and error would be taken by somebody of us, so the time is money (i.e. he could have been elsewhere earning money in this time), but among us are peeps who would be no less than pleased to spend a while on the machinery, i think so, so i dont see this being a problem



Bases for PL-C lamps (and by the way for CFLs, which are yet another option to consider, including the CFL ballasts) are made by other manufacturers. All it would take is get the same base and drill out a round hole (covering the 4 PL tube holes) with a drill press, and cement in the SOX lamp. None of the steps even involves any actual "lamp technology" (not counting the cement)

(PL-C and PL-T use the same base and are electrically identical, for the wattages where both lamps exist, but the PL-C size Plastic body of the lamp base would probably be a better match for the tapered neck of a SOX lamp)



Custom electronics have never been a problem. Many companies make PCBs to order (without soldered components) for peanuts. The starter circuit is very simple, so for tiny production, it may be sufficient to just put it together with a soldering iron. (not joking, even big companies do this with low demand products). If the demand goes up, its only for the better

The component to be changed vs. an ordinary Y1112-based or similar Fluorescent starter is a capacitor used for timing the preheat. Nothing bad would happen even when using the starter as is (there just will be 2 seconds delay before the lamp strikes). Changing the capacitor to a lower value shortens this time, since the SOX lamp does not need any preheating, it can be changed to some minimal value, so on one hand the delay is too short to notice, but on the other hand the capacitor is still there to not make big changes to the circuit (it might not work if the capacitor is skipped completely)

The approval might or might not be a problem

If we find a way to appeal in a way in which the LED does not (there may be some ways to think of), the SOX may become the lamp of choice for some users. Examples include higher efficacy in the higher wattages (up to 200 Lm/W), more genuine vintage appearance, and even the run up show if we manage to present this as a feature (for the artistic applications of the lamp)

In more simplified terms, here are the facts.

1.  You won't be able to purchase the equipment.
2.  You won't be able to produce the lamps.
3.  You won't be able to change the industry.  
4.  You won't be able to change the public's perception or interest levels or anything like that regarding the SOX lamp.  There is just way too much more important stuff going on in the world that has peoples attention vs an outdated and inefficient light system.  
5.  You don't have to like the fact that things like SOX and MV lamps have their days numbered, but there is not a dang thing you can do about it.  There are many things way out of your control.  That's the way life goes.  

I know I said I wouldn't comment on this further, but I have to say just one thing.

Yes, I am interested in the way things are made, and I would love to visit Hamilton if it can be arranged, but the time, effort and money needed to continue to manufacture SOX lamps I really think is, while maybe not impossible (most things can be done if you throw enough money at them) is totally impractical considering what would actually be involved.

At the end of the day, I am a lamp collector not a lamp manufacturer.

I know I said I wouldn't comment on this further, but I have to say just one thing.

Yes, I am interested in the way things are made, and I would love to visit Hamilton if it can be arranged, but the time, effort and money needed to continue to manufacture SOX lamps I really think is, while maybe not impossible (most things can be done if you throw enough money at them) is totally impractical considering what would actually be involved.

At the end of the day, I am a lamp collector not a lamp manufacturer.

I concur.

The machinery, place, transport, source materials cost money, but it is yet an open question how much money and whether they can be arranged for less money. We can't progress with answering this question before acquring more information

The trial and error would be taken by somebody of us, so the time is money (i.e. he could have been elsewhere earning money in this time), but among us are peeps who would be no less than pleased to spend a while on the machinery, i think so, so i dont see this being a problem



Bases for PL-C lamps (and by the way for CFLs, which are yet another option to consider, including the CFL ballasts) are made by other manufacturers. All it would take is get the same base and drill out a round hole (covering the 4 PL tube holes) with a drill press, and cement in the SOX lamp. None of the steps even involves any actual "lamp technology" (not counting the cement)

(PL-C and PL-T use the same base and are electrically identical, for the wattages where both lamps exist, but the PL-C size Plastic body of the lamp base would probably be a better match for the tapered neck of a SOX lamp)


If we find a way to appeal in a way in which the LED does not (there may be some ways to think of), the SOX may become the lamp of choice for some users. Examples include higher efficacy in the higher wattages (up to 200 Lm/W), more genuine vintage appearance, and even the run up show if we manage to present this as a feature (for the artistic applications of the lamp)

If you had to make a guess, how many such potential customers would you say we could have? I think that is ver very small number of people who want to have more genuine vintage appearance without getting real sox lantern and real lamp, and even with those wanting a real lantern most of would be collectors and enthusiast like us. The run up show is for most of the people thing that they dont care or may watch it maybe once. I would estimate only sale of few hundreds, if we are very lucky. More realisticly I would say selling even hundred would be hard.

What comes to high efficiency on higher wattage, I don't know if there is much demand ecxept those few legacy installations. Big sox lamps are nightmare in point of optics design.

And I'm still skeptic about that pl-t/c base able to support much heavier sox lamp. The lantern itself would need at least a support.


Also, what comes for those electronic ballast, wasn't there something about running LPS with hf ballast?