The History of Invention of Portable Lighting Tower
Who invented the 1st portable lighting tower?
This depends largely on your definition of a lighting tower. A broad definition might include something as simple as a candle or primitive torch placed on a tall mast to cast light over a big area, such a device has probably been used since the Stone Age.
In more up to date 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 could be the first machine of its kind filed in US patent 1934576 and is named as a transportable floodlighting unit for airfields.
The patent describes a chassis with four wheels at every 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 designed to be used to provide on-demand lighting of alternative landing sites at airfields on occasions when the main landing areas are out of use because of harsh weather conditions.
More lately in 1980 a US patent 4181929 was filed for a Portable illuminating tower that illustrates a much nearer resemblance to current day lighting towers.
The US patent 4181929 describes a cartable lighting tower consisting of a base frame ( which contains an engine and generator ) and a vertical, extending, hydraulic mast with two electric lamps at the upper end. The unit doesn’t permit towing but instead is light and compact enough to be simply transported. The design also includes jack legs that are now common place on all lighting towers to ensure stability in strong winds.
This is quite a significant development in the history of the lighting tower as this patent largely forms the basis of most present 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 next patent was filed later on in the same year of 1980 but was for an answer to provide more in depth illumination. The US patent 4220981 describes a chassis with four 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 permits for the masts to be rotated enabling finer control over the area of illumination. By offering two masts the light tower also allows for illumination over virtually every side of the machine. This is not like prior light towers which generally offer illumination on only 1 side of the machine.
Since 1980 considerable progress has been manufactured by lighting tower makers. Though the final design has varied tiny from those seen in the 1980s many improvements have been made to make lighting towers better 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 framework design which allows virtually any generator to be used to power the light heads.
The TCP Ecolite lighting tower in addition has damaged new ground by utilising extremely cheap lamps to reduce fuel consumption dramatically, which is especially timely seeing as global warming is becoming a more and more prevalent concern.
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