This is topic How many hours can you get out of a xenon in forum Film Handlers' Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.
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Posted by William Phillips (Member # 1162) on 05-07-2002, 04:02 PM:
Lamp Osram 1600w HSC Warenty hours 1500
Projector Cinemeccanica Vic 5, CX21H lamphouse buckets of cooling, Irem N3X75 rectifier.
Just woundering how many hours people have taken this sort of lamp to. This machine is only 4 years old and done just over 10000 hours. The old projector ran vertical lamps and got around 3500-4000 hours out of a 450w Osram. The cinema that i was brought up in ran Cinemeccanica Vic 9 with CX1600 vertical lamphouse(bulbs last forever in those things.Were pulling lamps with 5000+hrs on). so i`m still getting used to these new fangled horizontal lamps. First few lamps pulled at warenty hours , since then been building the hours up, last one 2100hrs no flicker good light just got scared one night so pulled it out. any comments would be good. I`ve been looking at this site for about 6 months and its good to see people who careabout film 
Posted by Ben Wales (Member # 92) on 05-07-2002, 04:21 PM:
I as a rule change those Lamps in the 1600W Osrams at 2,000 +500 hrs,
yes, you can extend their life, but to what saving?, the more hours they done the greater risk of a lamp exploding and posible injury to personal and equipment damage!.
Posted by William Phillips (Member # 1162) on 05-07-2002, 04:31 PM:
Just curious about this type of lamp as its hours are only 1500. Some people say 1500hrs +25% for it and others say 2000 +25%.Osram have apparently up-ed the hours to 2000hrs but not had any change on warenty cards yet. I am never going to run one as long as the old verticals though because of dangers etc( also now get a good budget for the year), also after safely disposing of the first lamp I would never like to hear one go while hot.
Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 05-07-2002, 05:56 PM:
I think it is pretty fun to "retire" an old Osram Xenon bulb before you throw it in the trash. Box it up. Toss it through the air. Listen to the bang. POW! Not quite as thrilling as setting off an M-80, but kind of cool anyway.I've got an Osram catalog at work, but us sign people don't have much need for Xenon. High pressure sodium, halogen, stuff for a solar powered billboard rig --yeah, I need that. But I can't explode any of it. Darn.
Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 05-07-2002, 06:48 PM:
I've always gone by the rule: Warranty + 25% but sooner if it needs it.
(It flickers, gets hard to strike, the glass gets dark or if you just get a bad feeling about it.)
I have personally seen a lamp that was supposed to be pulled at 1900 - 2000 hours get run up to almost 7000 hours.
I got a call to go to this theatre becase, "The light was acting funny." I opened the lamphouse, looked inside and said, "Change the F***ing lamp!"
I have a picture of it . I believe I posted it on this board somewhere.
Posted by Dustin Mitchell (Member # 372) on 05-08-2002, 12:01 AM:
I have gotten as much as 8,000 hours out of a lamp without any envelope darkening (Christie CXL-20 2,000watt lamp, Christie SLC lamphouse). The lamp was changed not due to poor lightening of the screen or difficulty to strike, but merely because I was concerned about the excessive hours.Next time I pull out a perfectly fine 1600watt lamp with 4,000 hours on it I'll take a picture to prove it.
Posted by Jeff Skallan (Member # 891) on 05-08-2002, 03:36 AM:
Dustin,
I can vouch for the endurance of a 2k Christie lamp. We've been using that exact lamp (Christie CXL-20R) in our Neumade XCN-35 lamphouse/console with V-5s and have consistently produced well over 7,500 hours. All without any blackening, flicker, or stability issues. Nothing short of excellent!
Posted by Jeff Skallan (Member # 891) on 05-08-2002, 03:42 AM:
Also, I should add that these lamps were never rotated. --Jeff
Posted by Peter Kerchinsky (Member # 1098) on 05-08-2002, 05:04 AM:
We run the Christie CXL20Rs in all 10 of our booths, which have the vertical Cinema Film Systems consoles. We average about 4000 hours on each bulb, no blackening, no flicker etc.
Believe me, I'm really surprised too!
Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 05-08-2002, 05:10 AM:
The best I've seen was 8500 hours on a Christie 2K lamp in a Christie SLC console. The same reason for changing it applied there too...that's just too many hours and concern prevailed. Still, the bulb had no darkening, had a stable arc, was never rotated and ignited effortlessly. Ya just can't beat these bulbs! 
I might also add that the one and only time I have ever had a Christie lamp fail, Christie immediately gave proper credit without any effort on my part. Excellent backing of a great product!
Posted by Aldo Baez (Member # 790) on 05-08-2002, 05:33 PM:
I have to agree Brad. Last week a changed out a 2k bulb with 6600 hours on it, decided to simply because that's just alot of hours. More than double any other lamp in the theatre, still looked good too.
Posted by Will Kutler (Member # 770) on 05-08-2002, 06:50 PM:
I have not used Christie Bulbs, but from the talk on F.T., I understand that they are far superior than Perkin-Elmer.My old employer insisted Perkin-Elmer bulbs in new Christie Consoles. Why, I do not know. Average life was 2000 hrs. Our in-house area-tech. insisted on replacing them at 2000 hrs regardless of performance. I guess that the company was concerned about non-Christie bulbs exploding with age thereby voiding Christie warranties and putting them in a bad (light) with Christie...or so I've been told.
Posted by Daniel Boisson (Member # 1027) on 05-08-2002, 10:28 PM:
we had several at over 6000 hours, one was at 2000watt, the others were 1600. We changed then cause they were just starting to flicker, most people didn't notice it, but it was really bugging the manager, he really noticed it.------------------
3% Body Fat. 1% Brain Activity.
Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 05-09-2002, 01:50 AM:
Will, I've nothing nice to say about Perkin-Elmer bulbs. They don't put out the light that others do, they are far from reliable or stable, they come in packaging that mine as well be kitchen Saran Wrap, by the time they hit half life they are difficult to strike and not a one of them was putting out acceptable light by the time they hit their warranty period. In fact, by 75% of their warrantied life, I was usually groaning at their performance biting my tongue just waiting for the warrantied hours to hit so I could pull them.
I might also add that these were used in Christie SLC lamphouses which are the best I've ever used. For several years this theater ran exclusively Christie lamps in them, but as soon as the company switched to Perkin Elmer lamps the following started to happen:
It is important to note that these reflectors were PERFECT for several years before the theater started using Perkin Elmer bulbs!
I've also found that the Perkin Elmer bulbs are quite substantially "out of round". Here is a very short downloadable video showing a Perkin Elmer bulb being rotated.
LARGE QUICKTIME DOWNLOAD 1.27MB
MEDIUM QUICKTIME DOWNLOAD 863KB
SMALL QUICKTIME DOWNLOAD 286KB
What's that term? "Penny wise and pound foolish". That is the definition of these lamps as far as I am concerned. The slight cost savings on one of these lamps for say 2000 hours worth of use vs. buying a Christie or OSRAM and getting several thousand hours worth of use is just a foolish purchasing decision. I am THRILLED that this theater is finally back to buying Christie lamps!
Disclaimer: these are my opinions and findings. I'm sure if anyone else out there has actually had good luck with these lamps they will post here.
Posted by Carl King (Member # 398) on 05-09-2002, 11:34 AM:
I run Osram lamps in three Vic 8s and four Vic IVs. The
Vic IVs use the CX1600 lamphouse with 1600W lamps and the
Vic 8s use Super Lumex lamphouses with 2000W lamps. All
lamps get changed at about 2500 hrs. Horizontal lamps
get rotated every 500 hrs
Posted by Bill Hallsworth (Member # 1240) on 05-09-2002, 05:19 PM:
We run Christie CXL20R's in Strong X-90's, and have had up to 4000 hours with no problems. Our bigger houses run CXL30R's in Highlight consoles, and the best we can do is about 2500 or so.We have also used the Strong LTIX bulbs, and these are crap compared to the Christie lamps. They generally last about 50% of any other lamps I've delt with.
Posted by Owen Shave (Member # 1156) on 05-14-2002, 05:03 PM:
I think most multiplexes tend to push their bulbs a little too far. We had a 6k Osram explode last week taking the mirror and heat shield with it.. it'd done over 1100 hours and I believe they are rated to 600 hrs.
hmmm.. a nice mess it left in the lamphouse.
some of the glass had actually welded itself to the cathode!Owen
Posted by Robert Golding (Member # 746) on 05-14-2002, 06:48 PM:
I will only run christie bulbs in my strong x 60 d lamp. I'm a drive in and run a 4000 watt xenon with an average life of 3500 to 4000 hrs with no darkening or striking problems. I have accomplished this by running an a/c vent to my input fan. In the past I've tried many different types of bulbs, but have found christie's are the only way to go. Before adding the a/c duct I was only getting 1800 hrs before they either started to darken or striking problems. I also found that not rotating my bulbs helped.