Neon lamp: Meaning (information, definition, explanation, facts)

Neon lamps are small bulbs filled with neon and used as indicator bulbs producing a orange/red glow. This is not to be confused with neon signage. Neon lamps, in general, consist of a gas-discharge tube containing neon at low pressure and, when electified by alternating currents a luminescence is produced by the action of currents at high frequencies that are around the tube.

A neon lamp can be excited by AC or DC. In AC excited lamps, both electrodes produce light and glow, but in a DC excited lamp, only one electrode glows. This simple fact can be used to distinguish between AC and DC sources using a neon lamp.

Most neon lamps start conducting at a fairly consistent 60 to 80 volts, so they were used as very simple voltage regulators. They were also used for a variety of other purposes; since a neon lamp can act as a relaxation oscillator with an added resistor and capacitor, it can be used as a simple flashing lamp or audio oscillator. In the 1960s GE and other firms made special extra-stable neon lamps for electronic uses. They even devised digital logic circuits, binary memories, and frequency dividers using neons. Such circuits appeared in electronic organs of the 1950s, as well as some instrumentation.