The Lamp Room

Since acquiring the 10x Mazda red coloured GLS bulbs that have a very vibrant appearance when lit up makes me think, does the red coating of these specific ones contain cadmium? When switched off the coating is not too vibrant - like a 'cardinal red' sort of appearance

From what I know is that cadmium based coloured incandescent bulbs have a very vibrant appearance when unlit, But could it be the case with ones that are like my Mazda red GLS bulbs I got recently?

Also when did cadmium stopped being used in coloured GLS bulbs?

Flurofan96

Hello,

Can you upload a pict of said lamp?
Beeing a colorglazed lamp it is in my opinion highly possible to contain cadmium as coloring.
Generally all colorglazed lamps by there construction contain glass that is stained with metal ions. Cadmium is fairly common due to its vibrant colors.

Why were stopped beeing used?
Cost cutting. It was expensive to color glase bulbs. Better organic laquers were developed and hight resting inside coatings become popular, as they could simply be flushed in the bulb.
Cadmium was much longer very popular for the red fronts of infrared lamps, especially those for human therapy. They were replaced however in the early 2000s with stricter regulation regarding heavy metals in consumer products. By that however colorglazed lamps were already replaced due to cost cutting.

In germany Narva was believed to be the last producer of these lamps. The last batches would have been manufactured shortly after the reunification in the early 1990s from surplus glass bulbs.

best regards,

Alex