This page is as much
for my reference as yours! Simply a log of every update to the site
since it was launched in its current format, away back in May 2003.
I realise that some would say that this is a long, long time for a
website to go without a redesign, and you're probably right.
This
one does what I need it to though, and is easy to navigate and to
maintain. It doesn't need Flash this and Java that...all that does
is waste bandwidth. Given that the site's running on my own server
now, that is actually something I at least need to think about.
29th April 2023: An invisible
update again I'm afraid. The switch over to HTTPS it turned out broke
my visitor tracker...Fixing this was simple enough, just needed to update
the embedded Statcounter code...on every...single...page! There are
183 of them in case you wondered. Turns out there were actually a
dozen or so pages where it had never been added when I originally wrote
them. Oops.
24th April 2023: Another
update you're unlikely to really notice. The site is now being served
over HTTPS. This is a change I was somewhat reticent to make as I know
some people (including myself!) use this website as one that you can point
ancient browsers at and still have the page render correctly. However
I'm sick of the Google Search Console complaining at me, and have been made
aware that this actually does result in the search results being depreciated
albeit I believe only on mobile devices - though given that about 95% of my
traffic these days comes from mobile devices that's not ideal!
21st April 2023: Nothing
you're likely to see - but a few dead links mostly on older pages have been
pruned, primarily to get the Sitemap generator to quit whining at me every
time I ran an update request.
4th April 2023: Uploaded the completely
re-written page for the
Toshiba T5200/200 portable computer. Kind of embarrassed it's
taken me this long given that the original version was thrown together in
about half an hour back in 2009 or earlier and was a mess. All new
text, photography and actually accurate system specs now all present.
Given that this was one of the busiest pages on the website in terms of
search engine traffic it really needed a bit more than a fresh coat of
paint.
15th March 2023: Added the
Toshiba T1950CT laptop computer
to the Vintage Technology Section.
I've implemented some changes to how images are handled with this page - so
they should now dynamically scale according to the viewport size as reported
by your browser. This should make things far more pleasant if you're
viewing the site on a modern high resolution display (no more postage stamp
sized in line pictures), and should also play more nicely with mobile
devices - most notably in that it should for the first time ever make the
site actually readable in portrait mode. If you run into any issues
let me know. On the same note I have fixed the images on the page of
the Prinztronic Mini 7
Calculator - it used to require continual scrolling back and forth to
view on some mobile devices. I know there are a few pages affected by
this, I'll try to get them fixed shortly. It's not a difficult job,
just a bit tedious.
9th March 2023: Tidied up the
links page a little (sorted everything in
each section alphabetically rather than just what order they were added in)
and added a new links to Caps
Wiki.
21st December 2022: Added some actual body
text to the page for the Peugeot 306
Sedan...which has just consisted of a single photograph since...uuuh...about
mid 2015 I think.
15th December 2022: After a long, somewhat
torturous development process which resulted in me re-writing the thing from
scratch at least five times, the main page for my
1973 AC Model 70 is finally live
in the automotive section. I'm pretty
sure this is probably the longest page anywhere on this website by a couple
of orders of magnitude - it's definitely the one which has required the most
brain power and lost me the most hair to write!
25th November 2022: Added a
section on my links page for photography
services reflecting the two suppliers I use regularly these days.
24th November 2022: Added the page for the
1978 Vauxhall Cavalier to the
automotive section. This will be
updated in due course as the restoration of the vehicle progresses.
1st November 2022: Following
feedback from some users stating that they found the white on black text
hard to read I have changed the background from a deep black to a more
unobtrusive pattern in a dark grey colour. Hopefully folks will find
this helps.
I have (finally) nearly
finished putting together the page for the Invacar - this has taken forever
as it's by far the longest and most involved one I have ever put together
for the Automotive section.
In addition to the main page
for the Invacar I have also put together a shorter
FAQ page to address some of
the questions, misunderstandings and dodgy facts that are in common
circulation about these cars. That
FAQ is now live. A
placeholder has also appeared for the recently bought 1978 Vauxhall
Cavalier.
18th March 2021: Updated the page for the
1983 Citroen
BX 14RE. Also made a couple of changes to the wording on the
landing page and have updated the Favicon to something less cryptic - the
old one was meant to be a stylised representation of a compact fluorescent
lamp - though there's only so much you can do with a 16 pixel square!.
13th March 2021: New page added for the
1983 Citroen BX 14RE which
has been added to the automotive fleet. I've also rearranged the table
on the cars page so they are listed
chronologically by date of manufacture. They were just listed by the
order I'd written the page before and it was getting messy. Similarly
I'll be going through the lighting pages and rearranging things
alphabetically where relevant...No idea why I didn't do that originally.
10th February 2021: New page
added for the Prinztronic
Mini 7 Calculator to the Vintage
Technology Page. For all it's a relatively inexpensive one from
its period, has to be one of the nicest looking designs I've got in here I
think.
25th January 2021: Added the page for the
Generic
Transparent Solar Powered Credit-Card Style Calculator. Felt it
was worth having an example of the end of the calculator market where
they've become so cheap as to be give-away items in addition to some of the
high quality instruments from the heyday of the technology in the collection
and on this page.
Note that I have also started to remove any
links to loz.zelandeth.org. The LOZ prefix on the address is a
holdover from when I had several websites hosted on this server and is no
longer needed. Bookmarks can now be updated to just
http://zelandeth.org - though the
original address will still resolve correctly so it's not essential.
17th January 2021:
Added the Casio
PF-3000 Calculator and Data Bank to the
Vintage Technology Page.
I've also rearranged the tables on that page so items are arranged in
alphabetical order to make them easier to read. I'll be doing the same
elsewhere on the site in the near future. The "as added" order made
sense when there were only a handful of entries, but it's just a mess these
days in most cases.
11th January 2021: Not entirely unexpectedly,
within about 30 minutes of putting the main update live yesterday evening I
had compiled a list of snagging work I needed to do which was *just about*
successfully crammed onto two sides of A4 paper. I think everything on
that list has now been resolved. The majority of the changes were
simply (aside from fixing things that were broken!) things like ensuring the
typeface and size is consistent throughout the site, ensuring that all pages
have a consistently located home/back button, that every page has the
StatCounter code correctly embedded in it, and ensuring that the viewport
size was properly declared in the page code (to hopefully stop the Google
Search console from nagging me about it!).
As a regular reader one of the things you're
most likely to notice is that the appearance of the tables on a number of
the pages has changed. After a bit of experimentation I came to the
conclusion that doing away with the red table borders actually vastly
reduced the visual clutter on a lot of the pages, also allowing me to space
content out a little better without making things look horribly awkward.
In terms of actual site layout changes there
are a couple, one of my aims going forward is to keep each of the main areas
of the site more clearly separated from each other so it's easier to
navigate. The Specta,
Colour Rendering Index Test
and Streetlighting pages have been moved
to be subsections of the Lighting
Technology Section. This just makes more sense to my mind and
helps reduce clutter in the navigation frame. They're still exactly
the same pages, just the route taken to get to them is changed slightly.
The
links page has also been
given a going-through so everything in there should now be live again (I
think the dead-link ratio on the old page was about 80%).
I'll be continuing the bug-fixing and such
over the next few days as I'm sure I'll find more things I've missed.
If you spot anything glaringly obvious and/or broken please let me know!
10th January 2021: While it shouldn't be too
obvious outwardly, over the last couple of days I have done a LOT of tidying
up behind the scenes. I had no idea there were so many pages opening
in the wrong frames, circular links, orphaned pages I'd never linked into,
pages which didn't have link buttons back to the rest of the site from
etc...It basically took me a full day to sort the mess out! I also
discovered that a LOT of my pages were missing the Statcounter code....which
may explain why my recorded visitor numbers have plummeted quite so much in
recent years. Yeah...having lost the cost from my template won't have
helped!
8th January 2021: Fixed a factual error on
the page for the Kovac K-80D
regarding the device weight. Also fixed an issue with one of the
tables on the Vintage Technology page
being scaled to a set pixel width rather than scaling to the window
width...Goodness knows how many years that's been like that...
5th January 2021: I've moved the Flashlight
Reviews section to a new Archival section.
I *MAY* revive and rewrite some of these reviews, but it's simply not
something that I really have time to invest resources into these days.
Nothing has been deleted, the pages are all there - you just need to click
through a couple of pages to get to them now. I have no intention of
outright deleting anything, I've seen far too many websites I used to enjoy
browsing just disappear overnight that I've made it a rule that I'll never
do that.
4th January 2021: Added a new page in the
Vintage Technology section
for the Kovac K-80D
calculator. A nice little portable desktop unit from 1973 which is
built like a tank. Have also made a change to the introduction text on
the website landing page advising of the upcoming Spring Clean and archiving
of some of the older pages I wrote in my early to mid teens which make me
cringe to read now.
30th December 2020: I appear to have fallen
headlong back into the hobby of collecting vintage calculators again after
not touching the hobby in over 15 years. Added a new page in the
vintage technology section for the recently acquired
Sharp EL-808 calculator
- only the second commercially available model to use an LCD - albeit a DSM
display which bears virtually no resemblance to an LCD as you'd recognise it
today.
31st December 2017: So in a vain attempt to
make it so that I can say I've updated the website this year...Here's an
update on the
Xantia's page to reflect that she's now been sold on to a friend.
Likewise have updated the
Skoda's page to
reflect it also having moved on to pastures new. There are two more vehicles which will be making an appearance here soon
too...
13th November 2016: In response to
E-mails from a couple of regular readers, I can confirm that I am in fact
not dead. Nor have I been abducted by aliens. Life has just been
really busy recently and unfortunately the website has been pushed to the
back burner a bit.
A new addition will shortly be appearing on
the automotive page with my recently bought Lada Riva 1.5E Estate - Yes, I
have finally managed to find one - it's only taken me thirteen years of
searching! Watch this space, and a page should be appearing for that
soon. Hoping to include a bit of a buyer's guide for the Riva as well.
To make way for that, my
Citroen had to be sold on, but she has moved on to a long-standing
enthusiast and looks to have a long, pampered life ahead of her yet.
3rd February 2016: Sorry for the sporadic
dropouts over the last couple of weeks. Our internet connection has
been randomly dropping recently, and it's not entirely clear whether it is
our ISP having issues or if our router is on its last legs.
Also have made a small update to the webpage
for the Peugeot 107.
4th July 2015: Happy 4th of July to all my
American Readers (and those from elsewhere who celebrate it!). Added
a page for my most recent automotive acquisition, a 1998 Citroen Xantia 1.9TD
Sensation, allowing me to finally fulfill my long standing wish to
own a proper green-blooded Citroen.
24th
June 2015: Added the page for my
Peugeot
306 Sedan which is currently looking for a new home. Have also
been doing some background work adding alt text/titles to images
throughout the site. This is mainly to improve search performance
etc.
12th June 2015: Updated my 1989 Saab 900i's webpage
with a bit more text and a shedload more photos. Some more to follow
over the weekend too with a bit of luck.
10th June 2015: Holy updates Batman!
Um...Yes, I am actually still alive and rumours of my abduction are
greatly exaggerated.
What actually happened over the last year and
a bit has been quite involved, but the main points involved...getting
booted out of our rented house when the landlord decided to sell it,
buying a house, moving into it, my mother passing away very suddenly from
cancer, and the addition of a highly hyperactive puppy into our
family. Suffice to say, the poor old website has had to take a bit
of a back seat with all this going on. It's astonishing to be honest
that my Frankenserver has stayed online despite my having barely touched
it since the last update.
This update sees the addition of a page for
my 1987 Skoda 120LX.
...Which was bought back in September 2013...and I've only just had time
to sit down and scribble a page for. I have a few more pages half
written to add at some point in the future, but knowing my own history I'm
not going to make promises on dates!
15th December 2013: So we're back up and
running, after only 30 odd hours of downtime which was better than I had
expected. You may notice that the site is performing in a slightly
better now as well given that the connection I am now running from has
somewhere in the region of 8 times the upstream bandwidth available than
my old one. Biggest bottleneck now is probably the server itself,
which isn't likely to change any time soon given that it does what it has
to. Given that I *should* have a bit more free time now (well, once
the rubble from the move settles anyway) to update this place - you might
actually see some new uploads soon! I do actually mean that this
time...
22nd October 2012: Added a new lamp (Philips
Tornado ESaver CDL 865 20W) to the Spectra
page. Sorry for the lack of updates lately folks. Work's been
leaving me pretty wiped out lately with little brain power to spare in the
evenings. Have a lot of things lined up to get written, just
struggling to find the time and willpower to get to it!
12th July 2012: Added the page for the Philips
SL*9 Prismatic to the Compact
Fluorescent page. Not entirely happy with the text at this
stage, so there may be some edits over the next few days.
6th July 2012: Added the page for the Jacksta
40W Induction Lamp which I picked up recently out of pure
curiosity. This meant that I also had to write a proper intro page
for the Induction Lighting section
too as it previously just linked straight into the only item in that
category, the Philips QL 85.
4th June 2012: We're back! Sorry about
the downtime over the last couple of weeks folks. The server ran out
of disc space about two months ago, which was on my "need to fix that"
list for a while - but it kept running even with no space. Until the
power went out briefly and forced a restart, at which point I couldn't log
back in. Oh dear.
So I rummaged around until I tracked down a
more sensibly sized harddrive, an external harddrive caddy, the necessary
cables then got things up and running again. It's a bit of a mess,
but I'll do something later to sort the cables out. Hope that there
will be a couple of updates to follow in the next couple of weeks.
This has been an on-and-off issue for the last year or so, but the drive
that's gone in should have plenty of space for a while.
29th March 2012: Added the page for my
recently (and unexpectedly) acquired 1989
Saab 900i to the Automotive page.
18th November 2011: Updated the 1980
Volkswagen T25 Camper Van's page to more accurately reflect its
current status. Apologies for the lack of updates recently folks,
work and life in general have been very busy of late, leaving me with
little time (or energy!) for anything else, so I've not been getting
updates through as fast as I'd like. I do have a few things pretty
much ready to upload though, so hopefully should have some new stuff up
soon.
10th May 2011: Updated the Suzuki
Cappuccino's page, detailing what's happened since last April, and
the bad news regarding its current condition. Hopefully not
terminal, but at the very least it'll be off the road for quite some time.
6th May 2011: Uploaded the page for my new
automotive project, my 1980 Volkswagen
T25 Camper van. Expect to see updates to this page as the
project progresses.
4th May 2011: Good news everyone! I
have finally got my lazy tail in order and set up a virtual machine which
gives me access to my old web editing software. I've tried to
persevere with alternatives, however I have failed to find alternatives
which do the job as well as Microsoft FrontPage (as bundled in this case
with Office XP) did in terms of being a simple, WYSIWYG editor which can
handle tables properly. Yes, it's a cop out, yes there are probably
better programs out there - but this works for me, and does what I want it
to! Especially when you disable half the extensions it tries to make
use of which break page formatting in some browsers.
Bottom line is that this will mean that
updates will be considerably less hassle for me now, so should hopefully
appear a bit more frequently. They should also look somewhat better
as the spell checker in this thing works properly!
14th April 2011: Sorry about the downtime for the last
couple of weeks folks. Some file corruption had occurred on the
server which was preventing it from booting - unfortunately as it's set
up as a headless machine this meant that I couldn't get into it to
diagnose the problem until I had time to physically drag it through here
to a monitor! I've actually moved the website over onto a new
machine (though the original server is now back in a working state again
as a backup) partly to address some performance concerns, and partly in
recognition that the previous one - which was built out of scrap parts
about four years ago has been running 24/7 since then, with only a
failed network card in terms of attention since then! The new
machine also uses about 1/3 as much power, and is silent...so those are
also bonuses. Afraid I don't have any update to go up tonight -
but I do hope to have something up sometime shortly...not going to quote
times, as I never seem to meet my targets! I am still alive
though!
PS: If the site seems to be appearing and
disappearing even more than usual lately - it's likely due to DNS
issues. My router appears to be getting progressively more flakey
lately, and when it crashes, resets or reconnects itself, as I haven't got
a static IP address, it takes a while for the changes to filter through
once I've updated the redirection. Once it either annoys me enough
or dies completely I'll replace the router...but not yet.
16th September 2010: Added the Philips Econic 3W GU10 LED lamp to the LED
section. It's happening - LED's are starting to go mainstream.
What we're seeing on the shelves now I can't help but see as this decade's
equivalent to what was starting to appear on the shelves 20 years ago as
CFL's were just starting to appear. Expensive, unproven and
unknown...but with a huge amount of potential. The next few years
should be very interesting.
2nd September 2010: Added the Osram Dulux S 9W/67 Blue lamp to the compact
fluorescent section. Seems to have taken me an inordinately long
time to write this page for some reason...started it days ago!
28th August 2010: (Well, by an hour anyway...was nearly a
same day update!). Added the Philips TL 8W/35 Pink Coated Linear Fluorescent lamp
to the linear fluorescent section. Quite possibly the brightest
coloured lamp I've tried to take photographs of to date.
27th August 2010: Added the F8T5 Blue fluorescent tube made by some unknown
English company to the linear fluorescent section. ...Only three
years since I last added something to that one!
25th August 2010: Added the Megaman Compact 2000 11W lamp to the Compact
Fluorescent section.
15th August 2010: Added the Osram Dulux EL 15W Reflector lamp to the Compact
Fluorescent section.
12th August 2010: Added the Thorn A1/8 500W P283/25 projector lamp to the
incandescent lighting section. If you're a regular visitor, you
might notice a couple of things there have changed from my usual
template. Firstly, I've done a bit of post-processing on the images,
setting them on a neutral background. While it's a bit time
consuming, this makes my life a lot easier as one thing I lack in my
current apartment is space for a proper photography area. So this
means I can actually get away with a less than perfectly clear
background! Plus I think it does look a bit more professional.
You did escape from a black/red background fade only thanks to JPEG
compression artifacts which attack anything red however! I've also
changed the images the thumbnails link to from 800 pixels wide to 1024
pixels wide in light of the fact that monitor resolutions have increased
since I put the template together in 2002! The profile image on the
page however will remain at its current 800 pixels, as I do still have a
number of readers using 1024*768 displays. The only other change is
the addition of an "exhibit number" to the page itself. This is
purely to help me keep track of what's on here in conjunction with an
Excel spreadsheet. I've enough here now that I need to at least make
some effort to make sure that I don't duplicate myself - as given the fact
that these pages, even the simple ones take quite a while to put together,
realising I'd just duplicated a page would be rather annoying!
9th August 2010: Added the BELL 60W Twisted, Orange Tipped Candle Lamp to the Incandescent Lighting
section - Yes, a lot of the text is lifted from the last
update...Technologically they're quite similar, so I don't think it's
wholly unjustified. This one gets a mention though for being made by
one of the smaller lighting companies though, and one that's still going
actually - and who still have this listed in their current catalogue
even. Secondly, updated the Philips
Spotone 40 lamp's page - as it's been lacking any real information
for the last five years...yet despite this always seems to be in the top 5
of my most popular pages...So I've added some info! Some behind the
scenes housekeeping work has been done too, but you shouldn't notice
that. Finally, I dragged the server outside yesterday afternoon and
blasted about four years of dust out of it...The cloud was really quite
impressive! ...Does seem rather quieter now though!
6th August 2010: Couple of updates today. Added a
couple of new links to the links
page and added a rather old Mazda (no, not the car company) candle lamp, with a
rather odd sized bulb and pink powder coating on the tip of the bulb
to the incandescent
lighting page. Goodness...Three years since I last updated
that section...Yikes.
5th
July 2010: First flashlight review in a long, long while uploaded!
Picked up one of Mag's newer offerings a couple of months back - the XL100 - and have to admit to being very impressed.
28th
April 2010: Another one of the cars pages up. This time the turn of
my much missed 1981
Austin Metro.
27th
April 2010: What's this? Two updates within a week? Unheard
of! Put a page up for the most recent automotive acquisition - A Suzuki Cappuccino
25th
April 2010: Finally, after a full year got around to putting up a page for
my Peugeot 107...only
fair that it gets a page like any other I've had!
1st
March 2010: Weeeeee're baaaaa-aaaaack! Things have been a bit
tight financially over the last few months, and the server ended up
getting shut down as part of a wider range of things where I tried to see
what I could do to save every single penny possible. Net result of
the whole lot was nearly nothing...so things are now back to normal!
Fingers crossed they'll stay that way for a while.
12th December 2009: Sorry about the week or
so of downtime folks. For the first time since it was assembled
out of a pile of scrap parts from boxes around my room around May 2008,
the gremlins have had a go at Gorbash (my server), with the network card
deciding to lose all interest in exchanging data with the outside world.
As you can see, this has now been rectified. Sorry for the
lack of updates lately, work's been leaving me pretty shattered and
leaving relatively little time for me to dedicate to the site. I'm
hoping that I might get a chance to put a bit more time into it over the
festive period though.5th September 2009: Added the Megaman
Clusterlite 1060i 60W Compact Fluorescent lamp
to that section.13th August 2009: Added the
Prolite Daylite SCR-11W Blue
lamp to the Compact Fluorescent Page. There have also been
inumerable behind-the-scenes updates - the eagle-eyed among you may have
noticed a good deal of pages with long-dead wallpapers and links that
don't go anywhere have suddenly been fixed.9th August 2009: Updated
the page for the Timeguard TGNL15 Nightlight
with some info on its operating principles - and recategorised it, as
it's not actually a linear fluorescent lamp strictly speaking at
all...it's a cold cathode neon lamp...well...sort of. It's been
pushed into "others" now.
3rd August 2009: Finally
got around to fixing all the broken bits of page on the Flashlight Reviews Page...only taken me
eight months! Still, it's done now!
21st July 2009: Shock
horror...an update! Have started putting together the page for the
Toshiba
T5200/100 portable computer (I'm not saying laptop...it's bigger
than my lap!).25th June 2009: Okay...nearly two months
later than planned, but we're back in business! The reports of the
server meeting its end in an accident involving a 2nd floor flight of
stairs are greatly exagerrated! I'll probably be playing around
with cabling and positioning of some of the hardware over the next
couple of weeks, so the site may sporadically disappear for a few hours
here and there - but by and large, LOZ is back up!21st November 2008: Added the Luxina
Helix SCR-11W Red coloured compact fluorescent lamp
to the compact fluorescent page of the lighting section.14th November 2008: At the request of a
reader, I've started to put together a page which is basically a compilation of all the spectrograph photos for
lamps around the site. I'm retaking all of the photos - so it'll
be a while before they're all there. Not really of any scientific
value due to the rather crude equipment used - but I'm sure some of you
will find it of interest. If there's any lamps you'd be
particularly interested in seeing in there, drop me a line and I'll see
if I can find it.9th November 2008: Added the Panasonic EFG15E50R Reflector lamp to the CFL page
- been ages since I did a lighting update! Thought it was about
time I sorted that out!30th October 2008: No real updates recently
aside from the addition of my new car, a 1996 Lada Riva 1.5E Celebration to the automotive
page. I'm struggling really to find time to work on the site at
the moment, but will still endeavour to get things up as and when I
can. Apologies too about the brief outage yesterday - we had a
brief power failure here, and for some reason the router refused to talk
to the server afterwards until I manually removed its device entry and
recreated it. Took me a while to figure out what was going on
there!5th September 2008: Updated the page for the
Bush
VHF71, as restoration of this set is now fundamentally complete,
and the set is in regular use once again.27th August 2008: First major update since
the server move. I am now working on going through the site
page-by-page updating those where there are currently dead images or
links - this process may take me a while, but aside from the backgrounds
shouldn't be TOO extensive a problem, as the majority of the current
format site was produced after I worked out how relative filenames
worked. This has seen the addition of the Marconiphone T19A to the vintage technology page,
weeding out of some now defunct links from the links page and addition
of some fresh ones, and the addition of a new section for my interest in
streetlighting -
having decided to keep that separate to the general lighting
section. More to be added to that page soon, time permitting.30th May 2008: Sorry for the lack of updates
lately folks - I've been particularly busy, so the site's had to take a
back seat for a while. I did add a small update to the Saab's page yesterday though - just to show that I
am still alive!24th April 2008: Updated the Skoda Rapid's page with some photos from the
rust-location work which took place last weekend. More to come
next week hopefully! Also added the page for my current Saab 900.8th April 2008: Added the page for a couple
of preliminary photos for the Sony TFM-C580E clock radio which I dug out of our
loft last weekend to the vintage technology page.26th February 2008: Updated the Bush VHF71 page - the restoration is now underway.20th February 2008: What's this? Three
updates in three days?!? Added a brief page for the Bush VHF71 radio I purchased today, and put some
more photos up for the Defiant MSH 452AC. I'll try to get some more
photos up for the rest of the radios soon...19th February 2008: Minor update. Put
some more thumbnails up on the Vintage Technology page, and linked them
into profile images. If you'd like to see the page for any of the
radios I've just put up done first - give me a shout and I'll put it to
the top of the list! I like user feedback.18th February 2008: Discovered that
Frontpage for some unknown reason was butchering the coding of
hyperlinks in the frame. Having thinned out the settings it was
using, I've recreated the whole thing from scratch, which has reduced
the page size by about 50% as well! This addresses the fact that
Firefox was failing to recognise the link to the vintage technology
section before.15th December 2007: (Or thereabouts
anyway...forgot to update here!) Have started to rebuild the vintage
technology section (formerly called "Computers" which was a bit of a
misnomer as it had a whole bunch of other random tech in, and had been
in such a state for well over a year). It's a bit of a mess at the
moment, with only one working item - the Kolster Brandes KV024 television (thought I'd start
with one of the best things to go in there), but hopefully once the dust
clears and I get the tidying up finished it'll be a lot easier to follow
than before. I've made a slight change to the template being used
for pages from now on as well, using larger (100px high) thumbnails in
pages. I MAY go back through some of the more popular pages and
update them. No change will be made to the section introductions
or anything, the current 100px wide images will continue there.28th November 2007: Added the Sylvania
Mini-Lynx Pastel 11W Apricot lamp to the compact fluorescent page.25th September 2007: Added the Thorn EMI Low
Voltage Display Lamp to the incandescent lighting page.21st September 2007: Added the Atlas A1/210
Trufocus Projector lamp to the incandescent lighting page. I've
also tweaked the index page in the cars section so that another couple
of pages which are actually awaiting a rewrite are still visible - as
they were still getting hits even though there was no link to
them! I'll tidy them (Skoda Estelle and Lada Niva) up sometime
soon hopefully.18th September 2007: Added the Atlas 100W
Blue coated crown silvered lamp to the incandescent lighting page.
Also tweaked the text on the intro page a bit. Some housekeeping
was done behind the scenes as well, but nothing that should be visible
to you viewing the site (though if I appear to have broken anything -
please let me know!). Everything I deleted was related to the
previous incarnation of this site, and was a leftover from before before
the 2003 revamp...so shouldn't actually have been used any more.16th September 2007: The Rapid lives!
In need of some TLC...especially cosmetically, but I've finally got an
update on the page. Congratulations if you spotted the deliberate
mistake last update when I forgot to delete the fourth most recent
update from this page too! It was of course completely deliberate,
I never make mistakes...honest!8th September 2007: After nearly driving
myself insane trying to photograph it, added the Kingston Lamps PS60
green glass lamp to the incandescent lamps page.4th September 2007: Discovered a
half-finished webpage...so finished it. This was the page for the
miniature neon spiral lamp, which has now been added to the "others"
page in the lighting section.3rd September 2007: New email address
again! Finally saw the sense in getting an email address that
isn't tied to my ISP. zelandeth at googlemail dot com should be
used for all future correspondence.11th August 2007: Made a very, very overdue
update to the Philips QL85W page - finally added its text! Will
retake the photos shortly as well...my photography skills have moved on
a bit since 2005...5th August 2007: Updated my Corsa's
"journal" on the cars page. Can't believe it's been 5000 miles
since I got that car!2nd August 2007: Two new lamps added to the
lighting section. A Red version of an Osram Dulux lamp, and an
unusual E27 mains to 12V MR16 halogen retrofit unit by Economy Lighting
Limited.31st July 2007: I'm ALIVE! AS IS THE
WEBSITE! Apologies for the lack of updates of late, this has been
due to a technical problem which left me unable to upload to the server,
which as you can see, is now fixed. Expect normal service to
resume shortly! Updates to come in the lighting section, and the
Computers (Soon to be "Old Tech") section. As some of you may have
predicted...I've now become throughly hooked on fixing old radios as
well as computers and tellys...16th April 2007: You may have noticed that
there haven't been any updates since February...that's because my
internet connection fell over and died, and it's taken me until now to
get it sorted out. I did get a couple of pages written out during
this time, but had no way to upload them at the time. Will get
them up over the next few days I hope. ...Once I remember which
pages they were and where I saved them...I really need to put a notepad
on the desk for scribbling vital information like this on...24th February 2007: Aside from a couple of
additional photos for the beam profile section - the LumaRay FL12RX
review is now complete! Scoring a very respectable 92% too I might
add. If they keep producing lights like this I'm going to need a
new scoring system soon!22nd February 2007: Updated the LumaRay
FL12RX review page - still a work in progress, but at least there is
SOME text there now. Fingers crossed this will be completed this
weekend.18th February 2007: (actually did this a
little while back, but forgot to update this page. Sorry guys!!),
I'm now in the process of writing up the LumaRay FL12RX flashlight
review. Until such time as the full review is finished, some
photos and such can be viewed on the review page here.24th January 2007: Added the Philips
MasterColour CDM-R 35W PAR30L lamp to the Metal Halide page.18th January 2007: Added the Iwasaki Eye
G8T5 Germicidal Lamp to the linear fluorescent page (and yes, I know
there's no fluorescent bit...before ya start emailing me about
it!...it's the category it fits most...just believe me).13th January 2007: Added a page for my
current transport (Skoda's off the road for a little while due to a
broken gear linkage, and a few other things needed for the MOT at the
end of January), I give you Mr. Eco - my Vauxhall Corsa 1.5TD.14th December 2006: Another interesting lamp
that's been on my wish list for a long while - the rose coloured
Sylvania Mini-Lynx Pastel CFL. Given how short a production run
these lamps had, they must be at least somewhat rare now.12th December 2006: I seem to be on a roll
with these updates! New page added in the Compact fluorescent
section for *cue fanfare* My newly aquired original Philips SL*18.
I also have an SL*25 of similar vintage, which will be appearing shortly
as well.11th December 2006: New page added for the
Philips DXX/13162 800W projector lamp, and an few updates to the Megaman
DorS lamp's page from yesterday, as the donor of the lamp got in touch
with some additional info for me, which is now on the page.10th December 2006: Finally...an
update! No...really...a proper update! New page added for
the Megaman (No, not the little blue guy from the computer games and the
Bob & George webcomic...) DorS dimming Energy Saving lamp.
Interesting, and very "polished" product this.4th December 2006: Just a quick note to let
any regulars here (I know there are a couple of you!) know that I'm
actually back from holiday now. Normal service should resume over the
next weekend when I hope to get a couple of new pages up. Sorry for the
month of no updates!28th October 2006: Sorry for the lack of
updates lately folks. I've just moved into a new flat, and have
been busy trying to get things organised. One of the main problems
I've been having so far has been replicating the "Photo Stage" I had set
up in my old room - so I appologise for the slightly sparce and rougher
than usual looking photos on the BELL round LED bulb's page - which I
just added!28th September 2006: Added the page for the
Osram Halospot 70 50W 12V 24° lamp to the Incandescent section.
Can't actually remember the last time I was one of these out in the
"real world" now that I come to think of it.23rd September 2006: Added the page for the
Osram Active 60W lamp, the sister product of the Osram Relax 60W added
earlier in the year.19th September 2006: Finally got around to
adding the webpage for my 1988 Saab 900i. As with the Skoda's
page, this will be almost a diary like thing showing updates as they
happen.9th September 2006: ...By 43 minutes.
Effectively a same day update! Added the General Electric Elegance
FLE20HLX/T3/827/B22-6Y-GE helical CFL to the CFL page. Have had
this rolling around my desk for a while, figured it was time it was put
here! I also added an email link to the navigation frame, as I
just realised that there's none anywhere aside from one buried away in
the "updates" page, which people very seldom look at. Oops!8th September 2006: Added (albeit somewhat
later than planned!) the final one of the coloured CFL set here.
The Green 15W Impact Color Spiral. Some of the more observant of
you may also have spotted that the previous lamp took the items on
display past the 50 mark. Now...just to get the rest of the actual
collection up!1st September 2006: Added the page for the
Impact Colour Spiral 15W Red helical CFL. If you're thinking this
looks suspiciously like the last entry, you'd be right, as it's part of
a set of four lamps. One more to go!30th August 2006: Added the page for the
Impact Colour Spiral 15W Blue helical CFL. Okay, so I have a soft
spot for coloured fluorescents...24th August 2006: Added text to the
Timeguard TGNL15's page. Interesting little gizmo that one,
technically more a fixture than a lamp...but it fits here.21st August 2006: Added the index page for
the linear fluorescent section, and the Timeguard TGNL15 nightlight to
it, just pages for now, the text will happen over the next few days.6th August 2006: Added a page for my most
recent vintage TV acquisition. A 1959 GEC BT304. Not much to
report on it yet, but for those of you interested in such things, the
page is here.3rd August 2006: Started the MUCH needed
update on the automotive section. For the time being pulled down
all of the old pages as they were desperately in need of redoing -
including re-scanning of the photos taken before I had the digital
camera. I have however added the page for my current car, my Skoda
Rapid 135RiC.10th July 2006: Finally...a new flashlight
review! Ed of LumaRay was kind enough to send me one of their
brand sparkly newly redesigned FL6's - which are due to be released
shortly. They've done a rather impressive job with the
redesign...read all about it here...11th June 2006: Added the Marathon 11W/827
GLS shape CFL to the page. Bit of a scruffy old lamp this one, but
one with a lot of memories to go with it for me.10th June 2006: Added the Tesco 11W CFL's
rich GE brother - the Elegance 11W to the CFL page. Corrected A
couple of typos in the aforementioned page too.10th June 2006: Added the Tesco Value 11W
CFL (Rebadged GE "Elegance") to the relevent page...it's got a
crazy-long model number I'm far too lazy to type out yet again
here! Another economy-class CFL to the list.4th June 2006: Added the description to the
page for the Connect-IT 30W CFL.7th May 2006: Added the PowerPlus 9W Energy
Saving bulb to the Compact Fluorescent page. Tiny little thing,
this lamp.24th April 2006: Completed the Iwasaki EYE
160W Blended mercury PAR38 reflector lamp's page. The text's a bit
sketchy in places, but it'll do for now. Better than having
nothing there!22nd April 2006: Added the framework for the
Iwasaki EYE 160W Blended mercury PAR38 reflector lamp to the mercury
vapour section. Hope to get the description up tomorrow
evening. Know a couple of you have been waiting for this one,
sorry for the delay!28th March 2006: GE 15W red "Pygmy" lamp
page added to the incandescent section. Remember I used to see
these things all over the place when I was younger, was a bit of a trip
down memory lane finding one the other day.24th March 2006: A non-lighting related
update! A very good friend of mine gave me a rather old television
recently, a restoration candidate. A Kolster-Brandes KV-024.
I haven't got very far with it yet, but here's a webpage about it!
Only one of its type I've managed to find anything about so far.17th March 2006: The LED section finally
makes its much awaited (okay, maybe at least one person's been waiting
for it anyway...maybe) appearance, with the Pro-Lite DioTronic orange
GU10 1.8W lamp being the first exhibit to be added there. If
anyone knows where Pro-Lite have hidden their website (if they have
one), can you let me know please! I sure can't find it.16th March 2006: Sorry for the lack of
updates lately, weekends have been pretty busy of late, and I've not had
a huge amount of time to work on the site. Managed to get the page
for the Philips HPI-T Plus 400W lamp up tonight though. Glad to
get something new up in the Metal Halide section...though it did remind
me that the pages already there need rewriting! D'OH!28th February 2006: After a bit of a delay,
I finally completed the page for the Philips PL E-T Pro 23W. I did
have a page up for this before, but it was one of the very first ones I
put up...the original one was taken down when the lighting section was
rewritten, so this one was just rewritten from the ground up.12th February 2006: Same day update!
Well, actually the last update was at just after midnight...this one's
the following evening...Have added a full description for the Saverlamp
85W Spiral Compact Fluorescent lamp. Yeah, the really big one that
has been here for ever...but never got a description to go with it...all
there now!12th February 2006: After spending what
seemed like forever writing its page, added the Philips Master PL-C 10W
lamp to the Compact Fluorescent section. First non-integrated CF
lamp in my collection.28th January 2006: Finally got around to
reformatting the Flashlight Reviews page as per the new site
format. No new reviews added though. I just really don't
have the time to write them at the moment! I also got rid of the
"coming now" list...as it was pointless and confusing. If
something important it coming up, it'll get shown. Otherwise,
you'll just have to watch this page!23rd January 2006: Added the basic page for
the Philips 2-in-1 CF/LED Nightlight. First Hybrid lamp!
Text to follow tomorrow or later in the week as time permits.21st January 2006: Added the GE Daylight
incandescent lamp to the Incandescent section. Finally got the
full description up for the Deren 20W CFL in the Compact Fluorescent
section. Also finally remembered to get rid of the Christmas
greeting in the page title...so you can quit emailing me about that now!16th January 2006: First update of the new
year. Added the Osram Relax 60W lamp to the Incandescent page.22nd December 2005: Added page for the GE
Lightstream 12V 50W green dichroic halogen lamp to the Incandescent
section.21st December 2005: Started work on updating
the Gallery pages. This is probably going to be a somewhat ongoing
project, but I want to get it cleaned up a bit in the next week or
so. No new material there yet - but it's a lot easier to find your
way around at least! Hand drawn section up this evening. And
I also shifted the clock which used to be at the base of this page to
the updates page...as it was rather random. I didn't want to get
rid of it entirely though, so just moved it somewhere less visible!13th December 2005: Boring update! Put
up the Legal Info page. Also been fixing up the Mercury Vapour
lighting index pages. All the subsections are there now.10th December 2005: What? Two updates
in as many days? Yep! Finished the Osram Dulux EL 23W
Vario's Page, and added the basic page for the Deran 2U 20W. Text
to follow tomorrow for that one.9th December 2005: Added the basic page for
the Osram Dulux EL 23W Vario self-dimming compact fluorescent
lamp. There'll be more text to follow soon on the page.
Images are all there though.25th November 2005: Excuse the lack of
updates this week, work's been busy, and I've not had much time to
myself to work on the site. Just added the General Electric BIAX
Electronic FLE15TBX/XM/840 to the Compact Fluorescent section
though. Hopefully get another couple of pages up over the
weekend. Don't have a huge amount of info on that lamp, so any
feedback is most welcome.18th November 2005: Added pages for Philips
SOX-E 18W and Philips 93123E low pressure mercury spectral lamps to
their respective sections. Text to follow, maybe tomorrow even. Think
I'll try to get a few pages up this weekend, then work on the text as I
get time.13th November 2005: Completed the entries
for the Philips 250W SON-T and the Osram SuperSOX 18W lamps. Osram
SOX/H 55W lamp added to Sodium Vapour Section.9th November 2005: Added the index page for
the sodium vapour section, and basic pages for the Philips 250W SON-T
lamp, and Osram SuperSox 18W lamp. Also played around a bit with a
few things under the skin of the site. Information on the
aforementioned pages is to follow.2nd November 2005: Updated the Morrisons Red
Bulb's entry on the Incandescent lighting page. Full description
now online.1st November 2005: New lamp added -
Incandescent Section. Morrisons Red Bulb.21st October 2005: New lamp added - Mercury
Vapour Section. Radium MRL 160W/235/E27 Mercury Blended lamp.9th October 2005: New lamp added -
Incandescent Section. The Easydim Self Dimming Lightbulb.
Interesting little thing. Spotted it in Maplin today, and couldn't
resist! Has been a rough week...so my answer was to buy a
lamp...sounds reasonable to me!28th September 2005: New lamp added...rather
an unusal one too. Philips Master QL 85W. Electrodeless
induction lighting sound interesting? Go take a look then.
Data is to follow, I just wanted to get the page up ASAP.26th September 2005: Two more lamps added,
both to the incandescent section. Osram Decostar 51S (Actually a
complete rewrite of its old page), and the Instant Gifts International
"Blacklite Bulb".25th September 2005: And the updates to the
lighting page continue. Omicron SYE-11 has been re-added to the
CFL section, and the Possibly custom made sign lamp added to the
Incandescent Section.23rd September 2005: Updated the frame with
new button images, and got rid of those silly mouseovers. Updated
all thumbnails on the lighting index page. Set up the "Wanted"
page. Added Two new lamps to Compact Fluorescent Page. Under
the skin, messed around with a lot of the file structure of the site
itself. Not visible, but that's made life a lot easier for me!22nd September 2005: MANY! Incandescent
section on the Lighting page now active - 5 new lamps added.
Compact Fluorescent page - 1 new lamp added. Lighting index page -
Thumbnails all updated. I've got a new camera now - so expect to
be seeing a lot of updates to photos throughout the site. I have
also finally worked out how relative file addressing works! This
has allowed me to significantly speed up the update process!17th September 2005: WE'RE BACK! As
you probably noticed, the site has been down - for several months in
fact. This was due to a problem with the DNS Nameservers
apparently (Artamir, the server actually never went down!), the problem
has now been sorted - normal service shall resume!15th July 2005: Why am I up at 2:39AM
again? Oh yeah, was finishing a review off. Got the LumaRay
FL-12 review done. It achieved a very respectable score too.11th July 2005: Work goes on on the LED
& Lighting page. Metal Halide and CFL sections are up and
running now. The rest hopefully tomorrow. I realise a few of
the pages are lacking in text. That will follow shortly, right
now, I'm just concentrating on actually getting all the new framework up
and running. Just deleted over 10Mb of junk files that were no
longer doing anything!7th July 2005: Pretty major update.
The LED & Lighting page is now being updated. Not just a
little touch of paint, I'm tearing the whole lot out and remodelling it
from the ground up. New index page, new format, new text for all
the old pages (though that will occur over time). So bear with me
if a few things are inaccessible for a few days, I'll do my best not to
break anything, but given that I've had to take the old index down,
there will be a few things you can't get to. Advance warning that
the frame will be undergoing surgery shortly as well. Though I am
hoping that will only involve being down for five or ten minutes as
it'll just be a matter of uploading a new frame.htm file.6th July 2005: Added new metal halide lamp
to the lighting page. TopSpot BLV 225101 HIT-150 G12/WW5th July 2005: Added three new lamps to the
lighting & LED page. Osram Decostar 51S, Realite MR11 Blue,
Osram Powerstar HQI.12th June 2005: Updated text on intro and
Flashlight Reviews pages. Fixed a dead link.8th May 2005: Again, 2:18AM, but new review
up! Got the LumaRay FL-6 review up.24th April 2005: Okay, it took me until 2:45
in the morning, but finally got the Heliotek HTE-1 review done! Also got
a prelim page for the LumaRay FL-6 up.15th April 2005: Added a couple of
preliminary review pages to the Flashlight Reviews page, including that
for the new Heliotek HTE-1. Not much text yet, but there are some photos
for you to look at.17th March 2005: Excuse the long period of
inactivity. Should have some updates to come soon. Have added some items
to the review listing, will get working on the reviews ASAP.15th November 2004: Finally added the Bell
Flicker Flame effect bulb's page in the LED & Lighting Section.31st October 2004: Added new link to the
Links page. Site run by a good friend of mine, and well worth a look.10th October 2004: Added the Energizer
Illumifold Lantern Review Page. Final Score: 88%21st August 2004: What the?!? ANOTHER
UPDATE...this is becoming an ugly habit. Added the Princeton Tec
Impact II Review Page. Final Score: 80%13th August 2004: What?!? Two updates
in one week...this is unheard of! Yes, unusual, but it's
true. What's more, two reviews written in one week! FINALLY
got the Osram Dulux Mini review done. Final Score: 78%. That
thing's number SEVEN on the reviews list...that's over a year it's been
on the to-do list...oops. Also, added a new feature to that
review, a Mini-review done by a friend of mine, intended to give an
impression of what someone who's not reviewing lights every other day
will think of it. Well done on his part I think, hopefully will
see this more in the future.10th August 2004: Completed the Solar LED
road Marker Review page. Final Score: 94%16th June 2004: Completed the Dorcy 2AA 4LED
Flashlight review page. Final Score: 78%.8th June 2004: I've been
busy...okay...that's why there haven't been updates for four
months...honest! Added the Dorcy 2AA 4LED flashlight page, albeit
without any text at present, and updated the Flashlight Reviews Listing
page.11th February 2004: Added the Nuwai
ALX-113AA Review page. Final Score: 88%. No other updates.8th February 2004: Updated this intro page
and tweaked the frame a bit. I've removed the links to the pages that
are no longer in use. This does not however mean that they won't
necessarily reappear at some point in the future, but for the time
being, I'm going to slimline the site layout a little, get rid of bits I
don't need...like buttons that don't go nowhere!25th December 2003: Completed and uploaded
the CMG Reactor 3 review page. Tried a different review format
this time, think it works a lot better. Apologies are due there to
Chris Millinship, the owner of The Torch Reviews Site, I based a lot of
the new format on his work (Because it's a work of nothing short of
sheer web design genius!). What I had not however intended, was
for my review format to end up quite so similar to his - which is has -
apart from the fact that his reviews are a lot better written, and his
photographs are a few million times better. I'll of course change
it if you wish me to Chris, it wasn't a deliberate copy, just that it's
hard to stray far from a page format like that when it's so clearly
brilliant!4th October 2003: Updated the Johnlight
Search Guard Review.25th September 2003: New Sketch in Hand
Drawn gallery. "Artists Block Sucks" I'll let you figure out where
the inspiration for that one came from (or not as the case may be! As
that's the whole reason it got drawn). Might finish it sometime,
just a random scribble right now.3rd September 2003: After much faffing
around trying to get it to work, finally got the Nixie Clock working on
the intro page. Might move it to the NavFrame when I get around to
resizing the images to fit...whenever that happens! If you don't
know what a Nixie is, go to Mike's Electric Stuff site and look at the
relevent section. On the other hand, if you're looking for a place
to buy them (especially the more rare types), Sphere Research have a
HUGE selection, mostly new and boxed as well.18th August 2003: Played around with the
Flashlight reviews page yet again, and FINALLY got the Nuwai AT-100
Review up. Found a few photos that are worthy of being added to
the gallery, will hopefully get them up in the near future.10th August 2003: Added the Osram Mini Combi
Review to the Flashlight Reviews page.7th August 2003: Redesigned the Flashlight
Reviews page, looks a bit more reasonable now In My Humble Opinion.6th August 2003: Added The Nuwai FX-602
Review to the Flashlight page. Changed the date format of the site
history to avoid the confusion that it seemed to be causing.
Cleaned up the Flashlight reviews index page, and altered the template a
bit. Will alter the image there soon as well, possibly introducing
an imagemap that would allow you to simply click on the image and go to
the relevent review. We'll see.12th May 2003: Erk...how long has it been
since I updated the history!?!? OOPS! A fair amount has been
done since I last updated this page.
As you probably noticed, I finally added
the flashlight & Illumination page. I am going to write a full
page for it and put a proper button in the NavFrame but for now, I've
just set up a pasic index of the reviews and a text link so that those
from CPF and anyone else interested can get to the reviews in the
interim. Presently, the following are working (Though most
incomplete). Johnlight Search Guard, Marksman 2AA,
Panasonic PowerLight FH-304, Nuwai AT-100