Cost effective solution to keep historical lenses without mercury bath

7.2.LED Light Sources in Traditional Optics

Many lighthouse services today are removing or decommissioning traditional optics and installing new, smaller, self-contained devices. There are often good economic reasons for doing this but sometimes there is a need to retain traditional optics. Some reasons for retaining the optics are:

High luminous range requirement;

Optics with complex characters or sectors;

Managing future strategy; and

Heritage.

If a traditional optic is retained, the choice of light source to use with it is important. Fitting a modern ‘off the shelf’ lamp in a large optic can produce poor results, so care must be taken in choosing a suitable lamp.

Over the last few years, in a drive to reduce energy requirements, LED lamps have been temporarily installed in a variety of large optics to see how the combination performed. R&RNAV have developed a LED light source that has performed well in traditional optics. The results of various light measurements with LED light sources are shown in this paper, together with details of problems encountered during the experiments.

1. 
   LED Light Sources.
   

Energy Saving.

Sector Lights.

7.3.Traditional Revolving Optic re-engineered for continued operation without mercury

In 2008 The Danish Maritime Safety Administration (DaMSA), now Danish Maritime Authority (DMA) had thirteen (13) operational lighthouses with mercury bath system.

Spillages of mercury at Nakkehoved lighthouse caused by an earthquake in Sweden in December 2008 tighten up the focus on use of mercury at Danish Lighthouses. Due to the environmental aspect it was decided to close down all mercury bath systems before 2015.

In general high intensity LED flashing lanterns with a range of approx. 18 NM range was chosen to maintain the light but at listed and historic lighthouses considerations should be taken for preserve the revolving optic.

In co-operation with The Technical University of Denmark (DTU) design and re-engineering efforts was taken to re-engineer the revolving system at Nakkehoved Lighthouse (lighthouse museum and listed lighthouse). The major aim was to avoid significant changes of the original construction and preserve the authentically expression of the unique installation at an operational lighthouse.

At the end of 2012 a draft project was presented by DMA and this was approved by the Danish Agency for Culture. In January 2013 the detailed design project was initiated and in the end of April 2013 the re-engineered system was put into operation.

1. 
   Historical background and environmental aspect of Mercury Bath System.
   

Re-engineering of the Mercury Bath System at Nakkehoved Lighthouse.

Lesson learned and recommendations.

7.4.Breathing new life into Prismatic Optics?

The presentation charted the evolution of light sources in Lighthouse lenses and describe how Prismatic lenses have followed these developments to get the best possible optical efficiency out of the combinations and clarify why subsequent modernisations have been difficult to date.

Following on from this summary it described how advances in LED technology make it possible once again to restore these icons of heritage to ‘best in class’ offering the most optical efficient method of lighting our seaways.

The presentation was designed to be ‘picture heavy’ to assist non English speaking delegates to realise the potential that now exists by describing combinations that have been modernised and verified in the field.

It was concluded that authorities need no longer wrestle with the dilemma of retaining old lenses which are past their best in terms of performance and up keep cost. They can once again be the most optically efficient method of providing a large range light.

The key points of the presentation were:

1. 
   Awaken participants to the potential of retaining prismatic optics as a viable option.
   
2. 
   Brief summary of how light sources and lenses have evolved.
   
3. 
   Suitability of LEDs as the next revolution.
   
4. 
   Summary of differing options to suit the varying types and vintages of lenses.