Main Light
Had changed from paraffin to Mercury Vapour lamp a couple of months before I arrived which meant operating a switch instead of taking 15 minutes to light the light,although the lens was still rotated by clockwork with the weight requiring rewinding every 90 minutes.
From what I remember if you didn't wind,after 100 minutes the alarm would operate and sound all the intercoms until reset.
This did mean a change in thinking,since I personally had never had a paraffin vapour lamp go out until extinguished in the morning,where now,with a mains electric failure the mercury vapour lamp would go out and require 10-15 minutes to restrike,which did give a chance to hand-start a standby generator.The generator was originally installed to charge the starter batteries for the Kelvin diesels and at the time the local electricity supply company did not allow live relays across there supply lines,hence the hand start.
All this changed with automation when batteries and invertors were installed,making mains failure immaterial.Point of Ayre uses the same basic system as Maughold Head.
Fog Signal
Operation as Fog Horn the pictures were taken at the Point
Radio Beacon
Every six minutes would transmit the morse code for PY several times followed by a continuous tone,allowing the radio operator aboard ship to rotate his aerial and obtain a bearing from the lighthouse.
Racon---RAdar beaCON
A Radar transponder triggered by the ships radar shows as a point on the radar screen giving distance and bearing followed by dots and dashes depicting the morse code for that particular racon's position.It is a small self-contained piece of equipment that periodically does a self-test and goes beep-beeeep if satisfactory.
Storm Signal
A combined operation with Meteorological Office,Coastguards and Lightkeepers-Visual gale warning signal,hoisted when a gale was expected within twelve hours,Consisting of a black cone three foot high and three foot wide at the base.
Primarily for the benefit of inshore craft,storm signals were discontinued c1981.
Meteorological
Observations every three hours and we were one of the lighthouses the public could contact for present weather conditions,you quickly learnt to give just that and whatever gale warnings the Met.Office had issued,otherwise Joe Public would be back with "you said the rain would stop,you said the gale would decrease,etc."
It was telephone contact to our local Met.Office at Ronaldsay Airport to pass the observations until 1991,when we were issued with a Laptop with appropriate program,press the right buttton and the observations were sent direct to the central Met.Office.
Minor Light
Refered to as Minor or Low light more commonly known as "Winkie" due to it's character of Flash every 3 secs.
Primary duties whatever the weather was to light and extinguish the light at the required times,to change the gas bottles as needed,paint and any other general maintenance.
So life went on until 8th.September 1982 when I was transferred to Maughold Head lighthouse.
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