The History of Invention of Cartable Lighting Tower
Who invented the 1st portable lighting tower?
This depends mostly on your definition of a lighting tower. A broad definition might include something as easy as a candle or primitive torch placed on a tall mast to cast light over a large area, such a device has doubtless been used since the Stone Age.
In more recent history it’s un-clear as to when the modern lighting tower was invented. Researching patent applications suggests that machines not dissimilar to today’s lighting towers were being designed in the 1930s.
A patent from 1932 shows what might be the first machine of its kind filed in US patent 1934576 and is named as a movable floodlighting unit for airports.
The patent describes a chassis with four wheels at each corner ( allowing the machine to be towed ), a generator powered by an engine and one giant electrical lamp at every end of the vehicle. The machine is intended to be used to provide on-demand lighting of alternative landing sites at airports on occasions when the main landing areas are out of use because of inclement weather conditions.
More lately in 1980 a US patent 4181929 was filed for a Portable illuminating tower that illustrates a much nearer similarity to present day lighting towers.
The US patent 4181929 describes a cartable lighting tower consisting of a base frame ( which has an engine and generator ) and a vertical, extending, hydraulic mast with 2 electric lamps at the upper end. The unit does not permit towing but instead is lightweight and compact enough to be simply transported. The design also includes jack legs that are now common place on all lighting towers to guarantee stability in strong winds.
This is reasonably a significant development in the history of the lighting tower as this patent principally forms the foundation of most modern day lighting towers which contain similar elements such as a base that stores the engine and generator along with an extending hydraulic mast that supports the luminaries.
The following patent was filed later on in the same year of 1980 but was for a solution to provide more extensive illumination. The US patent 4220981 describes a chassis with 4 wheels to hold the generator and engine and two folding telescopic masts at opposite corners of the frame that each hold a cluster of electric lamps. The design also allows for the masts to be revolved enabling finer control over the area of illumination. By offering two masts the light tower also allows for illumination over nearly every side of the machine. This is unlike prior light towers which sometimes offer illumination on only 1 side of the machine.
Since 1980 substantial progress has been made by lighting tower makers. Although the final design has sundry tiny from those seen in the 1980s many improvements have been made to make lighting towers simpler to use and more green.
The Hylite lighting tower from Taylor Construction Plant includes Adjustabeam technology which permits the user to adjust the direction of each lamp from the ground. The TCP Hylite also has a flexible chassis design which permits virtually any generator to be used to power the light heads.
The TCP Ecolite lighting tower has additionally damaged new ground by exploiting intensely economical lamps to reduce fuel consumption seriously, which is especially timely seeing as global warming is becoming a more and more prevalent concern.
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