Willis Lamm's
|
|
Darley Simplex E-326 "Eight bulb" 4-way signal |
|
The Darley E-326 was an interesting signal. Just as the D-200 was a "national standard" evolution of Darley's traditional 3-bulb 3-color signal, the company needed to produce a more modern signal for communities that still used 2-color signals. Thus the E-326 was the "8 bulb" option to Darley's original C-810 two bulb design. Each lens had its own bulb and red was on the top on all four sides.
The construction of this signal is identical to the D-200 signal except that it displayed two colors on each side instead of three. This particular signal came out of Williamson, WV. It appears to have originally been in service as a 4-way signal with an internal controller. Later it was adapted to be a two-way signal where two one-way streets met. At that time it was powered by an external controller. Most likely the external controller was used to produce a three second overlap indication when the signal changed. (The original Darley controllers simply changed from one color to another. As downtown city speeds increased, many communities reprogrammed their signals to either go dark for three seconds or display both red and green for three seconds to indicate that the light was changing.) I found four original portholes for the blanked off sides, however I am still in search of four Darley reflectors. Therefore the signal still only lights on two sides as it did when it was taken out of service. |
Parts stripped of old paint.
|
