Mid-1980s Sylvania 50ER95

The ellipsoidal-reflector (ER) incandescent lamp was introduced in 1976 by GE in the USA as an improvement to the standard blown-reflector (R) lamp. The shallow ellipsoidal reflector allows a better optical control of the emitted light with less spillage around the lamp, which considerably reduces light losses in recessed luminaires. This change allowed a significant reduction in power consumption while maintaining the same illumination levels in certain applications involving downlighters and track lights. In 1980, GTE Sylvania released a high-voltage variant of the ER lamps for the 220‒230 V mains in Europe. The 50ER95 shown here is the smallest model in the range, which included 75 and 120 W lamps. The present 50 W variant was aimed at replacing standard 75 and 100 W R95 lamps, enabling 33‒50 % energy saving. Although this lamp type proved popular in North America, demands in Europe remained very limited as a result of different lighting practices (e.g. reflector luminaires with silver-crown lamps being preferred in glare-free illuminations), leading Sylvania to eventually de-list high-voltage ER lamps in 1989.