Radium metal halide bulbs will not be produced anymore!

[jda]

I have Focal Grande Utopias and McIntosh stuff in the house and Focal Utopia no7 in one car. Believe me that you can hear the difference in AB vs D with good enough gear. I can even hear a difference in MOSFET vs Bipolar AB amps. Everybody should be able to hear a difference in tube amps. I can see how folks with cheaper speakers or lower quality material might not be able to tell... kinda like Stylophora vs 5 color deepwater acropora where one looks OK any any light and the other looks better under wider spectrum lighting.

Hamilton, ReefBrite and China have said that they will be around for bulbs as long as there is demand. Hammy and RB have both indicated that they have enough demand. There even might be a new kind of light, or two, to replace some that have disappeared, but I will believe it when I see it.

 

[jda]

You should have no trouble using those Ushio bulbs for 2 years. I have and will be when my Phoenix run out.

 

[A. grandis]

That "one year life" of the bulbs in average was when we used to run those halides for 8 - 12 hours a day back in the day, and to maintain top spectral quality. Even that could be stretched to 2 years easily for some bulbs. Main thing is to give a change for the corals to adapt to the new the bulbs when it's time to change them. Very hard to screw up with halides!
I'm not even discussing about speakers!!!!! You can hear that vinyl "just fine", or you can hear "profusely". It's all about that speaker spectrum! Ha!
Seriously... either you have good years for those differences, or you just don't care much for details!

 

[PeterErc]

Lol I get it, had Dynaudio three way front with Dirac and it sounded like t5, crystal clear and detailed. Went two way with horns and 8” ported Beyma’s in doors. Halide, crystal clear, dynamic with punch that puts a smile on your face and can get loud AF
Guess I will have to wait until Hamilton restocks the toilet paper to get some DE bulbs.
At some point you may have to buy old used fixtures just for the bulb.
But who knows, could be the end of civilization as we know it by the time that happens lol

 

[Bpb]

Home theater side of audio is lost on me. I don’t even have any type of audio system whatsoever at home. Native tv speakers for me and AirPods for watching something quietly. I’m 50+% deaf anyway and qualify for hearing aids at the ripe old age of 41. My audio correlation was more aimed toward tube amplifiers vs digital modeling for instrument amplification. I’d be absolutely lost trying to put together a home audio system. Likely just send JDA a direct message and say “what should I get for this amount of money” ha ha

 

[SpSDrew]

I did order some of the ebay marine color bulbs just for kicks so Ill use the parwise and so some comparisons when they arrive. I am not dead set on Hamilton being of the most quality bulb either as I have had 2 now explode on the inside after a few weeks of use.

Bottom is marine color from eBay and top is Hamilton 14k.

Pretty darn close.

 

[minus9]

Bottom is marine color from eBay and top is Hamilton 14k.

Pretty darn close.

I’m currently using these bulbs, as Hamilton was out of stock when I needed to buy bulbs. They’re so close to the Hamilton, the only difference I see is the MC bulbs appear to be more blue or less crisp in the white part of the spectrum, but it’s pretty minor. Four bulbs for $75 shipped is pretty good.

 

[bobnicaragua]

I have Focal Grande Utopias and McIntosh stuff in the house and Focal Utopia no7 in one car. Believe me that you can hear the difference in AB vs D with good enough gear. I can even hear a difference in MOSFET vs Bipolar AB amps. Everybody should be able to hear a difference in tube amps. I can see how folks with cheaper speakers or lower quality material might not be able to tell... kinda like Stylophora vs 5 color deepwater acropora where one looks OK any any light and the other looks better under wider spectrum lighting.

Hamilton, ReefBrite and China have said that they will be around for bulbs as long as there is demand. Hammy and RB have both indicated that they have enough demand. There even might be a new kind of light, or two, to replace some that have disappeared, but I will believe it when I see it.

I have a primaluna integrated stereo with KT150s power tubes and old stock preamp tubes. It’s paired with KLH model 5 speakers.

I bought some halide bulbs a couple years ago, Hamilton or Reefbrite can’t remember, that were made by JJ electronics, a vacuum tube manufacturer.

 

[jda]

I got a pair of MarineColor bulbs. 3 months in, one cracked and I had to disassemble the socket to get all of the pieces out. Color and output was fine, as I posted about somewhere. The glass and build was really shoddy.

 

[A. grandis]

Those SPS bulbs are terrible!

First impression of a South Pacific Sunlight (SPS) metal halide lamp.

With some of the best metal halide bulbs, like the Japanese single ended Iwasaki 250W/400W 6500K, the German singe ended Ushio 250W 14K, and the German single ended Radium 250W/400W 20K discontinued, many of us wonder how the metal halide users will "survive" in this hobby in the future! I was...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Reefahholic]

This really sucks. All they’re thinking about is money. What can they make the most money with.

 

[Bpb]

They have. It’s called the Hamilton 20,000k

Someone posted Hamilton sources their bulbs actually from JJ Electronics which is primarily a vacuum tube company located in Slovakia. Cheap and decent tubes for your guitar amps. Whooda thunkit?! I always thought they sourced them from China

 

[jda]

I don't know where Hammy gets their bulbs made anymore, but if it is an audio company, then that market is Lava Hot right now and probably not going anywhere.

 

[oreo54]

Someone posted Hamilton sources their bulbs actually from JJ Electronics which is primarily a vacuum tube company located in Slovakia. Cheap and decent tubes for your guitar amps. Whooda thunkit?! I always thought they sourced them from China

Years ago there was a poster that gave a sort of "history" about what is built where in mh land. Not sure it was Slovokia but somewhere in the general vicinity of E. Europe.
If I remember correctly is was just the cores.. not the whole bulb.
That is how Radium ect can say "Made in Germany" yet have foreign parts.
more like assembled in Germany..

Now it was one person who claimed to have this "insider" type knowledge. I did accept it though.

Like making cars.. parts from everywhere...

 

[jda]

@PaulErik used to work in the industry - maybe he knows.

 

[Bpb]

Either way, if true, it would make sense from a quality standpoint. JJ tubes are about on par with Hamilton bulbs among the pecking order and quality perception by the end users. “Good enough”

 

[oreo54]

For fun, You just like expensive stuff?.. Rhetorical.

The Global Supply of Vacuum Tubes: What Happens Now?

Several weeks back, Jay Jay French discussed in his article, “Nero Fiddles while Rome…” (Issue 158), that the atrocities still taking place in Ukraine make our pastime of audio seem frivolous in the shadow of greater existential threats. He is correct, and I’m sure many of us feel the same...

www.psaudio.com

A pair of Western Electric 300B power tubes (their only model at the moment), built in the US in Rossville, Georgia, costs $1,499.

 

[Bpb]

For fun, You just like expensive stuff?.. Rhetorical.

The Global Supply of Vacuum Tubes: What Happens Now?

Several weeks back, Jay Jay French discussed in his article, “Nero Fiddles while Rome…” (Issue 158), that the atrocities still taking place in Ukraine make our pastime of audio seem frivolous in the shadow of greater existential threats. He is correct, and I’m sure many of us feel the same...

www.psaudio.com

Lol I’m very much a “good enough” type dude. Paying thousands for matched sets of NOS boutique tubes is for people in a tax bracket I’ll never sniff. I had too much fun in my 20’s

 

[oreo54]

Well I need to retract (for the time being) my e europe arc tube thing.
Pretty sure I somehow mixed this thread up w/ something else.

Anyways their point was almost all the major brands are the same bulb basically using BLV (German) arc tubes.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/hamilton-metal-halide-bulbs-junk.738657/page-2

Which is now owned by Ushio

Company History

History Ushio Germany looks back on a long history. Founded in 1968 as BLV Licht- und Vakuumtechnik GmbH, the company introduced a variety of innovative products to the market and became one of the leading manufacturers for specialized lighting solutions worldwide. In 1990, the company was...

www.blv-licht.com

I don't know..
Hamiltons come from Holland..
????

 

[jda]

I have some soviet era vacuum tubes from Eastern Europe for some of my McIntosh amps that folks would probably inflict bodily harm on me to get. These were cheap when Americans were throwing away their vinyl and buying solid state stereo gear... like boxes of them in the packaging for $20.