DG Nova 3 Bulb Number?

On Jun 15, 2014, at 08:49 , Toby Thain <toby at telegraphics.com.au> wrote: That's a pretty tempting solution. Those original bulbs are quite fragile, and appear to be quite prone to suffering lead breakage near the glass seal. Here's what I just posted on VCF, for those (few?) folks who are here but not there: -------- 8< cut here 8< -------- Regarding the console bulbs, I found that one of mine that snapped off at the base still has an intact filament. I was able to probe the wires at the glass seals to light it up and measure current. The bulbs are normally powered from an unregulated 14V rail as I understand things, and I measured the voltage at around 15V on my machine. The broken-off bulb draws 39mA at 14V and the filament color is quite orange. It draws 50mA at 28V and has a normal-looking color temperature. I conclude that the original bulbs were probably designed for 28V operation or so, and are used at lower voltage in the Nova 3 to increase service life (?). McMaster-Carr and Digi-Key both have some bulbs that look like possible substitutes. I think I'll try some 2185 bulbs from Digi-Key since I'm ordering other stuff from them anyway, unless anybody has a better confirmed cross-ref. Those are 28V 40mA bulbs. I also received an email from another collector who used KH 4-280-040A-1 bulbs from KH Lamp in his Nova. He reports that he got them from Swedish distributor Elfa as part number 33-657-98. That's a 28V 40mA T1-1/4 bulb. -- Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net> http://www.nf6x.net/