I cross stitch large patterns, usually on 18 count aida, which causes a lot of strain for my eyes, especially when doing little confetti stitches within a larger stitched area. I'd previously had a cheap dazor-knockoff from ebay that I'd been very unhappy with as it constantly tipped over and used a regular lightbulb which created quite a bit of heat. More than once, I'd burned myself by brushing up against the bare bulb.
When I saw this one advertised, I took a chance and purchased, and the gamble paid off. First, the daylight spectrum light illuminates every nook and cranny. It uses low wattage and comes encased with a plastic shield that prevents contact with the bulb. This feature does complicate bulb replacement as you have to unscrew the shield in order to swap out bulbs, but it's an easy sacrifice to make in exchange for protection for and from the bare light.
The foot of the pedestal comes with five heavy extensions/feet...each weighs approximately 3-4 pounds, and it creates a substantial base that never once teetered as I adjusted and pulled on the arm to swivel it into position. Assembly seemed complicated when I first pulled it out of the box, but it's actually pretty simple. There's a plate on the bottom that you unscrew, you fit the little feet into the base, put the plate back on, screw it tight, insert the pole into the assembled pedestal (I had to whack mine against the floor a couple of times to get it fully inserted), and place the lighting fixture into the pole. The kit comes with a little wrench and bolt tightener...no additional tools required. Another plus, imo.
The lens is made of heavy glass and has good magnification. Each joint has adjustable resistence, even a little knob that controls that swivel of the lens head (something my other light did not have).
All of these points make for a good sale, but when you add in the price it makes for an excellent bargain. I paid only 20 dollars less than the price of this light for my cheap fixture that soon found its way into the Goodwill donation bin (even money if you counted my shipping fees versus Amazon's free shipping), and the Dazor lights I was looking at were three times the price. So to find one that is comparable in quality yet so affordable was a blessing.
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I purchased this for my mom who is almost blind with macular degeneration. It is a great help to her so she can do things without having to hold a magnifying glass in one hand. Adjusts easily to any position.****Update--After a couple of years of daily use, a couple of problems have arisen. The joints loosen quickly and some of the tightening screws have fallen out. The first bulb didn't last long but I was able to find a replacement. That also burned out and it has been very hard to find a replacement bulb this diameter with pins on the same side. Most are made with pins on the opposite side. I finally bought a replacement light with more standard bulbs, but the replacement isn't as sturdy as this one was.
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Bought this for my father who has macular degeneration. He loves it, and can now read again. He was using an unlighted magnifier, but the bright light in this product is what makes it so effective for him.
11/1/11 Update: Bulb started flickering so I bought a replacment. Note that the replacment bulb needs the connector on the outside (my first bulb purchase had it on the inside so did not work). The light is still flickering on occasion so I think it is something in the light itself, not the bulb. My father no longer uses the light much since his condition has worsened and he now uses an electronic viewer. I knocked off one star due to the reliability issue.
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I purchased this lamp so that I can finish my quilts any time of day and see well to make the correct stab into the fabric. It is very nice and bright. But with a quilt on my lamp and the light's warmth, I sometimes am pretty overheated. I like that its base is so substantial and weighted. Someone with a strong back needs to move it. I haven't used the magnifying feature on it yet.
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Please take a look at my subsequent comments on this lamp. it hasn;t lasted well.
Initially the last few reviews are fairly on-point, but there were issues with my lamp. I did NOT opt to send it back as I tend to prefer to fix a problem when possible. I'm going to go through the fixes I had to work out to get the lamp working properly.
It's best to understand that I have spent a good part of my life working on professional benches in electronics with the lamp this is a somewhat reduced copy of. thus my expectations are of something made of metal, solid and robust, mean to function for decades. This Normandie lamp has a slightly smaller magnifier (not bad at all but a bit smaller) and the entire lamp head and housing is plastic rather than metal in construction. This means coarse-thread metal screws into plastic, overall. To be clear, I'm talking about the lamp head here, the base is a good combination of plastic and metal and seems quite serviceable with all holding nuts and bolts being metal, as is the main support pole and the pantograph arm. The base is as mentioned, decently strong and of some mass.
I used Loctite on all threads that hold the pole to the base (including the through-base-bolt) as these sort of lamps have a reliable tendency to loosen up, get sloppy and then fall apart. I highly recommend this.
I was especially perplexed by the lamp head and the way mine had been assembled: with the mounting stud post REVERSED, pointing UNDER the lamp head, so that the lamp COULD not be moved into it's necessary straight-out working position. Fixing this required me to completely disassemble the lamp head.
On this newer design, with a transformerless power supply for the lamp, the power supply is a single small circuit board crammed into a small box area that is integral to the lamp housing. Not sure how long these last, I have several transformer desk lamps that are still working fine, some after 40 years. Again, this housing assembly is all plastic so playing with the metal-screws-into-plastic means extra care not to strip the threads.
This mounting post is bolted through into the power supply box and it is necessary to open the box (3 screws), remove the plastic circular shield around the fluorescent bulb (4 screws) and remove the bulb, pullout the circuit card (there's just enough wire to allow this), to get at the large nut that secures the post mount. Not much room to get in there with a crescent wrench but it's doable if you're careful. Worry here is that you'll break the plastic lamp housing trying to torque the large nut that holds the mount. I succeeded but was concerned throughout.
After loosening the large nut, it's easy to rotate the pole mount 180-degrees so it now points in the correct direction (straight out from the back of the lamp housing) then re-tighten the nut so it's solid.
I found that only one of 2 screws was installed to secure the circuit card to the box, and this one had been stripped out at the factory and wasn't dong anything. Rather than replacing the housing, they assumed one loose screw was plenty. I moved the screw from the stripped hole over to the unused hole and snugged it up.
After reassembling the lamp housing and plugging it in, all seemed good so I popped it on top of the pole base and it seems to be working. The lamp is a VERY high color-temp blueish and I'd be wary to make any artistic color judgments under it but it is indeed bright and clear.
