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Question and Answer Page

Friends, your response to the recent appeal for funds has been most heartwarming! Enough money was raised to pay our internet service fee for another year, to upgrade our storage (bandwidth allocation) and to perhaps expand the page's scope. To all of you who contributed, all the Guild Members wish to express our heartfelt gratitude! We thank each and all. Your names will be found on the Gratitude list at the bottom of the Home Page.

Donations to the Guild operating fund are of course welcome at any time! We don't need one hundred dollar contributions; a bunch of ten or twenty dollar gifts will keep us afloat!
Checks made out to IGLR may be sent to the Secretary (IGLR, c/o Fil Graff, 10111 Lincoln Way West, St. Thomas, PA 17252-9513), or for the convenience of our users, we have placed a direct Paypal link to our account below. We hope that the habit of occasional small gifts will be established! Thanks for reading this, and thanks for your gifts and kind thoughts.

Donate directly to the Guild via Paypal...use button below.

"Knowledge exists in two forms - lifeless, stored in books [or in closed minds], and alive in the [shared] consciousness of men. The second form...is the essential one."
paraphrasing Albert Einstein

Please read the information below before posting questions!
Disclaimer
The Guild is not a commercial organization, but a group of researchers! We assume that those who arrive directly on this page from another site or Search Engine might wonder who we are, and go to the About Us page to find out. There they will note we are researchers in liquid and gaseous fueled lamps, and any knowledge of things electrickeral is purely coincidental.

We do not and will not do appraisals here.
No one with a shred of integrity would do an appraisal over the internet, as there are just too many variables to consider. Hands-on examination is the only way to determine "value".

We do not evaluate items for sale (or that are about to be sold) on Internet auctions.
Please do not ask! To be more specific: "evaluate" is used here in the sense of not just pricing, but explanation of rarity or anything else a dealer might use to increase the perceived value of his merchandise. Dealers who elect to violate this policy will be banned from using this website.We never would have thought it necessary to post a notice like this, but here it is.

We are liquid and gaseous fueled lamp specialists
We are not electricians, physicists, or term paper or business plan writers (no kidding, someone really did ask.)

We are happy to try to help identify lamps
Including their origins and dates, how they work, whether restoration is possible and questions of that sort. See above: We do not buy here, sell here, or conduct any business here.

We strongly suggest a search of the Archives of this page before you post a question!
For many of the more common brands and lamps, your question may have already been answered. There are over 4000 answered questions in our files, all text-based searchable. Just use the "Question and Answers Archives" hot link found below. We also suggest a simple "Google" search of a brand or company name. Often, that's what WE have to do to get answers.

An excellent suggestion came from one of our users.
The information we need to identify a lamp, and save both you and us time, aggravation and e-mailing, should include:

  • An image.
    The image is likely the most important element. 99% of all questions need an image to go with them! The direct upload feature makes adding images EASY, even for those with limited computer skills. The image is captured right from your computer files. Images posted this way become a permanent part of the Archive files, as images hosted off-site do not. If you cannot make a .jpg or .gif image for some reason, or Direct upload will not accept your image, e-mail or snail-mail a photograph to the Secretary and he will post it for you. If you need multiple images with your question, please try to make a single composite image of them, or e-Mail them to the Secretary for him to combine and post for you! Having to combine already posted multiple images to conserve file space is a pain in the neck!

    We need to see the lamp, not your decor, back porch or yard!
    Please use a neutral background for your photos!

    One way or another:
    Please do not post questions until you are prepared to provide an image!

    One more image thing: If you opt not to use the direct upload feature for images (and it really is easy), when posting images directly to the board, then you need a "host site" available 24-7 to store the image for recall. Please do not use your computer's URL, or E-Bay or other temporary URL's! As soon as an auction is over (or you are not on-line), the image disappears or is unreachable, and is thus 'non-existent'.

  • The Maker (found on flame spreaders, wick knobs, filler caps, font tops, etc)

  • A Brand Name

  • A Description of the burner, flame spreader, wick mechanism (ie: how does it seem to burn and make light?)

    Please note: Dimensions, color of glass pieces, patterns embossed on the brass parts, description of chimney and such are likely not important at first to identify a lamp. They may help later to define it better, but are usually not key to identification.

If the terms used on this page are unfamiliar, we would recommend a visit to the Lamping Terms Dictionaries (both "American", and German to English) we provide (hot-linked on the Navigation Bar at the top of all pages.)

If your query does not receive an answer, you perhaps did not follow the query instructions above. Please check the information above and try again.

Incomplete or incomprehensible questions are now simply being deleted. The questioner is notified of such deletion, and invited to try again with an image, clearer question, or whatever.

Click here to add a new question.

Some final tips
  • Click on the subjects below to view or to answer questions.
  • All Questions will be automatically archived after 30 days with no answer posting activity.
  • Archived questions may be viewed and searched using question titles or key words by clicking Question and AnswerArchives
  • Reopening or answering an Archived Question requires re-entering it as a new question. It may be captured without retyping by highlighting the text you wish to copy, clicking "EDIT", then "COPY", going to the ADD QUESTION page, and placing the cursor in the Message box, clicking "PASTE".
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