An arc lamp is a type of electric lamp which produces light by creating an arc in the space

between two electrodes when electrical energy is supplied.

Working Principle of Arc Lamp

In carbon arc lamp, the electrodes are in contact at first which is in air. This causes a low voltage
to attain an arc. Then the electrodes are detached slowly. As a result of this, the electric current
gets heated and the arc is maintained between the electrodes. By the process of heating, the tip of
the carbon electrodes gets evaporated. The high-intensity light is produced by this carbon vapor
which is highly luminous in the arc. The color of the light produced depends on the temperature,
time and electrical characteristics.
In gas discharge lamps, the arc is produced in the space between the electrodes. Here, space is
filled with any inert gas. The arc is produced by the ionization of this particular gas. The
electrodes and the gas together are covered with a glass tube. When the electrodes are given high
voltage power supply, the atoms in the gas experienced an inconceivable electric force and it
results in the splitting of the atoms into free electrons and ions. Thus the ionizing of gas takes
place (ionization process).

The broken atoms (free electrons and ions) move in contrasting directions. The two charges (free
electrons and ions) collapse with each other and also with the electrodes. As a result, energy is
emitted in the form of a flash of light. This flash of light is called an arc. This is known as the
formation of the arc and is done by the discharging process. So it is also known as discharge
lamps. The name of the arc lamp and color of light emitted will directly depend on the atomic
structure of the inert gas that is filled in the glass tube.
The typical temperature of arc is over 3000oC or 5400oC. The color of the light emitted by the
xenon arc lamp is white (similar to natural daylight) which is used widely. From the neon arc
lamp, we get red color and from the mercury arc lamp, bluish color is obtained. The combination
of inert gasses are also used. They will give more even light spectrum in a wider range of
wavelength.
Application of Arc Lamps
Arc lamps are commonly used in:

 Outdoor lighting
 Flashlights in cameras
 Flood lights
 Searchlights
 Microscope lighting (and other research applications)
 Therapeutics
 Blueprinting
 Projectors (including cinema projectors)
  Endoscopy

The electrical light source which works on the principle of incandescent phenomenon is called
Incandescent Lamp. In other words, the lamp working due to glowing of the filament caused by
electric current through it, is called incandescent lamp.
How do Incandescent Lamps Work?
When an object is made hot, the atoms inside the object become thermally excited. If the object
does not melt, the outer orbit electrons of the atoms jump to higher energy level due to the
supplied energy. The electrons on these higher energy levels are not stable, they again fall back
to lower energy levels. While falling from higher to lower energy levels, the electrons release
their extra energy in a form of photons. These photons are then emitted from the surface of the
object in the form of electromagnetic radiation.
Following are the advantages of Incandescent Bulb:
➨It is less expensive due to lower initial cost.
➨It is easier to dim with rheostats.
➨It produces warmer color compare to fluorescent and thungsten-halogen lamps.
➨It generates relatively high light output.
➨It can be dimmed or controlled.
➨It is easy to install.
➨It is available in various shapes, sizes and applications.
➨It can be switched ON immediately.
Following are the disadvantages of Incandescent Bulb:
➨It is energy inefficient.
➨It has very short lamp life time i.e. about 1000 hours typically.
➨It is warm source of light and hence requires air conditioning to cool the room.
➨It has higher operating cost.
➨It is very fragile and hence needs to be handled very carefully.
➨It generates low lumen per watt. Ordinary incandescent bulbs produces about 5 to 20 lumens
per watt. This means it has lower efficacy.

What is Fluorescent Lamp?

A fluorescent lamp is a low weight mercury vapour lamp that uses fluorescence to deliver
visible light. An electric current in the gas energizes mercury vapor which delivers ultraviolet
radiation through discharge process and the ultraviolet radiation causes the phosphor coating of
the lamp inner wall to radiate visible light. A
fluorescent lamp has changed over electrical energy into useful light energy to a great deal more
proficiently than incandescent lamps. The normal luminous viability of fluorescent lighting
frameworks is 50 to100 lumens per watt, which is a few times the adequacy of incandescent
lamps with equivalent light yield.
How does a Fluorescent Lamp work?
Before going through the working principle of a fluorescent lamp, we will first show the circuit
of a fluorescent lamp in other words circuit of tube light.

Here we connect one ballast, and one switch and the supply is series as shown. Then we connect
the fluorescent tube and a starter across it.

 When we switch ON the supply, full voltage comes across the lamp and as well as across
the starter through the ballast. But at that instant, no discharge happens, i.e., no lumen
output from the lamp.
 At that full voltage first the glow discharge is established in the starter. This is because
the electrodes gap in the neon bulb of starter is much lesser than that of the fluorescent
lamp.
 Then gas inside the starter gets ionized due to this full voltage and heats the bimetallic
strip. That causes to bend the bimetallic strip to connect to the fixed contact. Now,
current starts flowing through the starter. Although the ionization potential of the neon is
more than that of the argon but still due to small electrode gap, a high voltage gradient
appears in the neon bulb and hence glow discharge gets started first in the starter.
 As soon as the current starts flowing through the touched contacts of the neon bulb of the
starter, the voltage across the neon bulb gets reduced since the current, causes a voltage
drop across the inductor(ballast). At reduced or no voltage across the neon bulb of the
starter, there will be no more gas discharge taking place and hence the bimetallic strip
gets cool and breaks away from the fixed contact. At the time of breaking of the contacts
in the neon bulb of the starter, the current gets interrupted, and hence at that moment, a
 large voltage surge comes across the inductor(ballast).

 This high valued surge voltage comes across the fluorescent lamp (tube light) electrodes
and strikes penning mixture (mixture argon gas and mercury vapor).
 Gas discharge process gets started and continues and hence current again gets a path to
flow through the fluorescent lamp tube (tube light) itself. During discharging of penning
gas mixture the resistance offered by the gas is lower than the resistance of starter.
 The discharge of mercury atoms produces ultraviolet radiation which in turn excites the
phosphor powder coating to radiate visible light.
 Starter gets inactive during glowing of fluorescent lamp (tube light) because no current
passes through the starter in that condition.
Physics of behind Fluorescent Lamp
When a sufficiently high voltage is applied across the electrodes, a strong electric field is set up.
A small amount of current through the electrodes filaments heats up the filament coil. As the
filament is oxide coated, a sufficient amount of electrons is produced, and they rush from the
negative electrode or cathode to the positive electrode or anode due to this strong electric field.
During the movement of free electrons, the discharge process gets established.
The basic discharge process always follows three steps:
1. Free electrons are derived from the electrodes, and they get accelerated by the electric
field applied.
2. Kinetic energy of the free electrons is converted into the excitation energy of the gas
atoms.
3. The excitation energy of the gas atoms gets converted into the radiation.
In the discharge process, a single ultra violates spectral line of 253.7 nm is produced at a low
pressure of mercury vapor. To generate 253.7 nm ultra violate ray the bulb temperature is kept
between 105 to 115oF.
The length to diameter ratio of the tube should be such that fixed wattage loss happens at both
ends. Where this wattage loss or glow of electrodes takes place is called cathode and anode fall
region. This watt loss is very small.
Again the cathodes should be oxide coated. Hot cathode provides an abundance of free electrons.
Hot cathodes, mean those electrodes which are heated by circulating current and this circulating
current is provided by choke or control gear. Few lamps have cold cathode also. Cold cathodes
have a larger effective area and higher voltage such as 11 kv is applied across them to get ions.
Gas starts to be discharged due to this high voltage application. But at 100 to 200 V the cathode
glow get separated from the cathode, it is called cathode fall. This provides a large supply of ions
which are accelerated to the anode to produce secondary electrons on impact which in term
produce more ions. But cathode-fall in hot cathode discharge is only at 10 V.

Fluorescent Light Tube Advantages

  Energy efficient- so far the best light for interior lighting
 Low production cost (of tubes, not of the ballasts)
 Long life of tubes
 Good selection of desired color temperature (cool whites to warm whites)
 Diffused light (good for general, even lighting, reducing harsh shadows)

Disadvantages of Fluorescent Light Tube

 The flicker of the high frequency can be imitated to humans (eye strain, headaches and
migraines)
 Flicker of common fluorescent light looks poor on video, and creates an ugly greenish or
yellow hue on camera.
 Diffused light (not good when you need a focused beam such as in a headlight or flashlight)
 Poorly/cheaply designed ballasts can create radio interference that disturbs other
electronics
 Poorly/cheaply designed ballasts can create fires when they overheat
 There is a small amount of mercury in the tubes
 A Imitating licker at the end of the life cycle.

How Gas Discharge Lamps work

As said before, a gas discharge lamp is a light source that generates light by creating an
electrical discharge through ionized gas. Typically, these lamps use nobble gases such as argon,
neon, krypton and xenon, or a mixture of these gasses. Many lamps are also filled with additional
gases like sodium and mercury, while some others have metal halide additives.

When power is applied to the lamp, an electrical field is generated in the tube. This field
accelerates free electrons in the ionized gas. The electrons collide with the gas and metal atoms.
Some electrons orbiting around these atoms are excited by the collision to a higher energy state.
When the electron of the excited atom returns to its previous energy state, it releases energy in the
form of photon. This light can be anything between IR, visible or UV radiation. Some lamps have
a fluorescent coating on the inside of the lamp to convert the UV radiation into visible light.

Some tubes contain some source of beta radiation to start ionization of the gas inside. in
these tubes, glow discharge around the cathode is minimized, in favor of a so called positive
column, filling the tube. Neon lamps is one good example.

1. How it Works:

There are several variations on how EL works depending on whether you are talking about a flat
panel light, rope light, DC EL technology, thin film EL display, or other complex design.
EL devices are monocarrier devices which give off light due to impact excitation of an optical
center like the Mn atom. They do this by transporting high energy electrons in the host matrix
(commonly ZnS).

For simplicity we will describe a simple EL lamp:

High voltage AC power passes through a thin layer of phosphor or semiconductor and this
causes emission of light. Two layers of solid material (one being transparent) act as electrodes
and a powder phosphor or semiconductor in between glows when electrons pass through it from
one electrode to another. Light escapes the device on one side thanks to the development of
transparent conductors like indium tin.

Thick phosphor powder EL Lamps are used in most simple lamps used for illumination
including the night lights and exit/safety signs. The graphic below shows thick phosphor lamps.

Advantages & Disadvantages

The advantages and disadvantages of electroluminescent display technology include the
following.

 Compact and Thin.

 Writing speed is good.
 It can be operated with Low-voltage.
 Efficiency is low
 Cost is high.
 It has high-voltage drivers
What do you mean by stroboscopic effect? How is this effect eliminated in fluorescent tube
lighting?

All gas discharge lamps operated on a 50 Hz alternating current supply are really flickering off
and on 100 times per second. In normal conditions, the human eye does not notice the fact. But
when a moving object like rotating parts of machinery is followed, at the certain speed it may
appear to be stationary or moving in series of jerks or rotating slowly than its actual speed. This
effect of producing an illusion of reality is known as the stroboscopic effect and this is obviously
a possible source of danger in factories, machine shops etc.
In fluorescent tube lighting the stroboscopic effect can be eliminated either by using a three lamp
unit in which each lamp is connected to a separate phase of a 3 phase, 4 wire supply or by using
a two-lamp unit in single phase supply each having its own choke but there is only one
condenser connected in series with one of the lamps.

The stroboscopic effect is a phenomenon of human visual perception in which motion is shown
to be interpreted by a brain that receives successive discreet images and stitches them together
with automatic aliases for temporal continuity. In short, motion is an artifact. Whether with a
flashing light source or through an aperture opening and closing, a strobe can control what the
eye sees of a moving object. Despite actually moving, if each retinal image is that of an object in
the same exact position, it will be perceived as being stationary. Stroboscopic control of
repetitive or predictive motion, such as the rotation of a wheel, can create an optical illusion that
is completely contrary to the true motion.

Stroboscopic Effect

an illusion of apparent motion or absence of motion that arises when an object or picture is viewe
d not continuously but during separate time intervals that succeed one another in a periodic mann
er. An example is the projection of a picture on a screen through a shutter consisting of a rotating
disk with slits that alternately passes and shuts off the projecting light. Another example is the ill
umination of a dark room by periodic flashes of light.
Stroboscopic effects are a result of persistence of vision—
that is, the retention in the viewer’s consciousness of a perceived visual image for a short time aft
er the picture or object producing the image disappears. If the time between successive intervals
when the picture or object is viewed is shorter than the visual-
persistence time, then the images resulting from the discrete acts of viewing are fused into a singl
e image, and the viewer thinks he continuously sees the picture or object.
Two types of stroboscopic effects may be distinguished. In one type, an illusion of apparent moti
on results when separate pictures are viewed intermittently and the positions of the objects in eac
h picture are slightly shifted relative to the positions in the preceding picture. This type of strobo
scopic effect is responsible for the perception of motion in motion pictures and television.
In the second type of stroboscopic effect, an illusion of apparent lack of motion or of slowed mot
ion occurs when a moving object periodically, with the frequency f1, takes up a previous position
. For the object to appear to be totally still, the frequency f of the moments when it is viewed mus
t be equal to f1 If f and f1 are not equal but differ by a small amount, then the frequency of the app
arent motion of the object is f – ft. In this case, the apparent motion may be much slower than the
actual motion and may differ from it in direction. The instruments used to achieve this type of str
oboscopic effect are known as stroboscopes.

What is direct lighting, semi direct lighting, semi indirect lighting ?

What do you mean by direct lighting?

In this lighting scheme the light does not reach the surface directly from the source, maximum
light is thrown upwards to the ceiling from which it is distributed all over the room by diffused
reflection. The glare being reduced the resulting illumination becomes softer. It is used for
decoration purposes in cinemas, theaters, and hotels etc. and in workshops where large machines
and other obstructions would cause troublesome shadows if direct lighting is employed.
What do you mean by semi-direct lighting?

In this lighting scheme the total light flux is made to fall downwards directly with the help of
semi-direct reflector on the working surface and also to illuminate the ceilings and walls. It is
best suited to rooms with high ceilings where a high level of uniformly distributed illumination is
desirable.

What do you mean semi-indirect lighting?

In this lighting scheme the light comes partly from the ceiling by diffused reflection and party
direct from the source on the working surface. As it is glare free with soft shadows it is mainly
used for indoor light decoration purposes.

What do you mean by general lighting?

In this lighting scheme lamps made of diffusing glass are employed which give almost equal
distribution of light in all direction.

What do you mean by local lighting?

Local lighting means an intense illumination on some particular points by means of adjustable
fittings. In this lighting scheme lamps are mounted in deep reflectors to avoid glare.

What do you mean by specular reflection and diffuse reflection?

Specular reflection means the reflection on some in the form of a beam of light but not scattered.
In this reflection, unless the eye is placed in the path of the reflected beam the viewer is unaware
of the existence of light.
Diffuse reflection means the reflection of light energy in the scattered form in all direction. In
this reflection, the viewer can see the illuminated surface but not the light source.

What do you mean by M.H.C.P ?

Mean Horizontal Candle Power ( M.H.C.P) is the mean of the candle powers in all directions in
the horizontal plane passing through the source of light.