Contrary to popular believe Thomas Alva Edison was not actually the inventor of light bulbs. The incandescent lamp, as it was often called, was actually invented by Warren de la Rue in 1820, almost 60 years prior to Edison’s invention. De la Rue realized that an electric current traveling through a thin filament will heat that filament to the point where it starts to glow. That is also what was causing all the problems.
The filament is a thin thread of material which is super heated by an electrical current. Once the filament reaches a certain temperature it starts glowing and emitting light. Just like a candle flame will. This effect is also what was causing the main trouble. Most materials simply burn up when they are heated to these temperatures. It took almost 50 years and hundreds of inventors to find the right material for the filament.
Thomas Alva Edison was one of the many inventors in the mid 1800s that were racing to be the first one to come up with a commercially viable technology to build incandescent lamps. The more memorable ones were Warren De La Rue, James Prescott Joule, Frederick de Moleyns, Sir Humphrey Davy and Heinrich Goebel.
It was the beginning of the industrialization of the world. Cities were racing to replace gas fired street lamps with something easier to manage and less dangerous. The electric lamp held a lot of promise but was useless unless somebody came up with a lamp that could burn at least a few hundred hours at a time. Many solutions were invented and discarded. Many materials were tested and found either too expensive or not lasting long enough.
And this is why today we remember Thomas Alva Edison as the inventor of the light bulb. With a stroke of genius he realized that you could extend the life span of the filament by simply denying it oxygen to burn. So he created a vacuum glass chamber and suspended a platinum filament in it. When he attached the electric current the filament did not immediately burn out but was able to burn for a little over an hour. History was made.
Even though it was an amazing accomplishment, it was simply not enough. Nobody would install electric street lighting if they would have to change the light bulb every 15 hours. He had to do much better. Thankfully Edison didn’t give up easy. He continued to experiment with all kinds of fibers, from the obvious to the obscure. He even asked biologists to send him fibers from exotic places and animals.
After thousands and thousands of experiments he started exploring cotton fibers enhanced with carbon as a material for the filament. Surprisingly the lamp kept burning for 15 hours before it finally gave out. It still took him another year though before he was able to come up with a design that actually worked for more than 1500 hours.
With today’s electrical advances there are so many different light bulbs to choose from it can be hard to pick the right ones for your lighting needs. If you know what type of lightbulbs you’re after, or even if you don’t, Netlamps will have the right one in their huge range of bulbs.