Page:Incandescent electric lighting- A practical description of the Edison system.djvu/128

 strain of being run above their rated capacity, it is necessary to rate them considerably below the efficiency at which they will give the best results under ordinary circumstances.

Lamps have been made and sold in England which have a very high rated efficiency, but parties buying these lamps are told that they will get very much more satisfactory results if they run the lamp below their rated capacity. So we see that some lamps are rated above their capacity and some are rated below, and the rated efficiency of a lamp is not always the best efficiency at which to run it. How then, are we to determine the efficiency at which a lamp will give the best results? It is this question which I will attempt to answer.

The term "maximum efficiency" of a lamp, as used in the title of this paper, does not mean the highest efficiency at which a lamp can be operated, but the efficiency at which the best results are produced by the lamp: or more