Bulb Boxes

[luc verschueren]

I have 3 Osram bulb boxes, which of these are Original ?

[Eric McKinley]

I am guessing you would like to know how to price them.

[luc verschueren]

No, I would like to know which of these are Original

[Joris Koning]

No, I would like to know which of these are Original

so you can price them? No offense but I only see you list parts for sale on our classifieds. Nothing wrong with that but I guess that is where Eric's and my earlier comment are coming from.

[Steve Douglas]

Original to what? None were originally supplied with a 356, nor were they in a factory made travel kit. Philips was most often supplied as accessory kits in the era. The clear cover one is probably the oldest late 50's maybe. I bought one like the left one, with the brighter blue cover new at an auto parts store Hamburg last year, about $22. There were many variations, some with manufacture logos (VW, Mercedes, Opel, for examples) with different bulbs, single and double contacts, long and short festoon bulbs for dome lights.
They aren't rare, in the eBay/The Samba world there are always some listed.

[Mike Wilson]

Wasn't there a bulb box in the travel kits? Maybe Eric's site has some info?

Mike

[Mike Wilson]

I just visited Eric's site. Travel kits had bulb boxes Go to his site to see the pics.

Mike

[Steve Douglas]

All of the original A, B and early C Travel kits I have seen had the Philips diagonally opening blue and yellow square boxes, for 6volt, blue and orange for 12volt. The later Cs and 911/912 kits came with various types, a blue and clear flat box, or a grey snap opening Philips bulb kits were the most common. These were offered separately by Stoddard in the 70's, 901.631.090.30 grey and .01 clear cover 12volt.
If bought at the factory the parts department would custom fill the travel kit to the engine and model/year. US dealers had the generic kits. There have been several styles of travel kits offered over the years, made up with repro and old stock parts, so many period parts may be "correct", but not original. Sierra Madre is one of the stores currently offering retro travel kits.

[Jim Alton]

I have browsed for these on eBay and at The Samba. My perception is that they are getting kind of rare (last I checked The Samba there were none). $ 22 sounds like a bargain--I've seen prices running maybe $ 70 to over $ 100.

I paid $ 35 a while back for one with a VW logo instead of Osram and a small crack.

It might be interesting to know more about them. I've seen some (typically not these orange & blue ones) with labels for specific cars... Were there different versions for different Porsches or were these generic for Porsche and other makes?

[Steve Douglas]

There are lots of vintage European spare bulb kits available, some even prewar and WWII military. Since the States used sealed beams, most of the kits that would be appropriate for a 50-60s German car have the European Tungsten headlight bulbs with the big flange style base. Autolampen is very common bulb kit, in lots of different metal boxes, I don't know anything about them.
Bosch made some metal boxes with script writing, there were Bakelite round boxes, with screw on lids, with Osram, Bosch, and even rare Marchal ones pop up now and then. Philips made the square boxed kits, in two styles an upright box that separates diagonally into two parts and the flat plastic boxes about 4" square. There are Mercedes, Skoda, VW, BMW, NSU, Opel, Volvo, Saab logos on some. Then there were the Lucas that could have an English marque logo, (Austin, MG, Rolls Royce, etc.)
In the 20s thru early 1950s many of the kits in the US were marked as Mazda Bulbs, a name that GE patened to designate Tungsten filament compared to the Edison style that was Carbon and fragile.
It could be a huge research project for someone to take on.
The store Classiccult has several kits listed.

[Eric McKinley]

Steve,

This is one of those autolampen sicherungen metal lamp boxes you refer too.

I carry this in my glove box, it has the script writing.

I had it painted heron grey as most of the original color was gone, unfortunately I can't show any further details as I am away from the car at the moment and this is the only picture I have.

I bought this on eBay about a year back for $50.

[luc verschueren]

Thanks to Steve, Mike and Jim for the information about bulb boxes

[Mike Wilson]

Glad to be of help, Luc.

Mike

[Edwin Ek]

All of the original A, B and early C Travel kits I have seen had the Philips diagonally opening blue and yellow square boxes, for 6volt, blue and orange for 12volt. The later Cs and 911/912 kits came with various types, a blue and clear flat box, or a grey snap opening Philips bulb kits were the most common. These were offered separately by Stoddard in the 70's, 901.631.090.30 grey and .01 clear cover 12volt.
If bought at the factory the parts department would custom fill the travel kit to the engine and model/year. US dealers had the generic kits. There have been several styles of travel kits offered over the years, made up with repro and old stock parts, so many period parts may be "correct", but not original. Sierra Madre is one of the stores currently offering retro travel kits.

My dad's 1964 C, which he picked up at the factory, had a travel kit. Common wisdom is that Porsche gave them as gifts to these customers. His travel kit has a blue and orange bulb box, and his car was a 6 volt.

[Jim Alton]

There was a post on Travel Kits back in January 2009: Travel Kit- ORIGINAL (lots of pictures).

The pictures show an orange and blue Osram bulb box.

There's another post from December 2014: Travel Kit Q.

While the provenance of that particular kit was unclear, it shows an orange and clear Osram bulb box with a Porsche part number (unusual format with "/" separators): 644/631/090/30.