Talk:Safety lamp

Untitled
Lots of history and chat but how do they work! Preceding comment added by 86.140.238.67 at 13:41, 18 May 2012

Spedding steel mill patent?
What evidence this was patented in 1760? (Reference given seems to lead back to a sales website: unlikely to be particularly well-informed (nor, one might think, actually a reliable/referenceable source)on the point). Principle was disclosed to Royal Society 1733 and Carlisle Spedding died 1755 (in a firedamp explosion). Rjccumbria (talk) 23:08, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Gauze vs mesh
An editor has systematically changed "gauze" to "mesh". Why? The usual term in the literature is gauze, mesh is usually significantly larger. I'm not about to start reverting this unilaterally since this is clearly important to, what do others think? If this is an ENGVAR issue, please note that this article has been written in British English, and I've just added the template to the top of the article to remind people. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 20:19, 11 March 2023 (UTC) – first sentence of the entry "safety lamps". To be fair, later in the article the term "wire gauze" is occasionally used, but unhyphenated. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 20:49, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
 * BTW, the plural of "mesh" is "meshes", not "meshs". Martin of Sheffield (talk) 20:26, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the comment. I thought this would be uncontroversial, gauze is usually cloth. As controversy has risen I'd change it back pending discussion, but that would now lose several later edits globally changing mesh to gauze, then finding where "mesh" was used originally and replacing it might be best. I note the OED says "a. A very thin, transparent fabric of silk, linen, or cotton.", "b. A similar fabric made of fine wire; usually with defining word, as wire-gauze". I think mesh is better than gauze; "wire-gauze" throughout would be better than just gauze. From the little I know of safety lamps, the mesh needn't be so fine as to be a gauze. I'll see what's said and if what I've done is considered wrong, will fix it. Re plural: a missed implication of global replacement. Best wishes, Pol098 (talk) 20:33, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Grabbing the nearest relevant book: "Whilst assisting at experiments for testing various safety lamps for coal mines ... observed that ordinary safety lamps having a vertical gauze surrounding the light ... which the explosive current impinged on the gauze causing ..."