ARTIFICIAL DAYLIGHT.

Wanganui Chronicle, Issue 12856, 16 December 1912, Page 4

ARTIFICIAL DAYLIGHT.

The ultimate aim and object of artificial lighting is to "turn night into day," and it has occurred recently to certain scientific investigators in the United States that the methods of illumination most commonly in' vogue fall j considerably short of the ideal. Neither the incandescent gas mantle nor the filament of the incandescent "electric lamp gives a perfectly white light. The flame of the electric arc varies in colour under different conditions from orange to violet or pale blue. In many branchest of Industry, notably those employed in the production of textiles, it is important, in order to secure a true "match" for colours that any artificial light used shall resemble daylight as nearly as possible, and it, is this essentially commercial demand which has stimulated reasearch with a view to improving upon existing lighting systems. 'Writing in the' "Technical World," Mr. Robert Franklin summarises in interesting fashion the results that have been attained. The nearest approach to the light of the sky that has been obtained to date is made by passing a low-tension current of electricity through a tube or globe containing rarefied carbonic acid gas. A continuous luminous tube of this description is utilised to pi'ovide the lighting in some of the more up-to-date American textile mills, the tube running right around the walls;of each apartment, and presenting the appearance of a narrow strip of vivid light, so well diffused that practically no shadows are cast. In many of the public buildings of America the. lighting, although carried out with the ordinary electric globes, is so arranged that none of the lights are directly visible. In churches what is kow.as the "bowlful of light" system is being largely adopted, a cluster oi powerful lamps 'being hung high in. a .bowl which shields their direct rays from the eye, the light bong reflected from the ceilings and walls. In other buildings the ligMs are concealed hum view behind the cornices.