Oregon Coast Real Estate Knowledge Center: Coast Photo Gallery featuring Online Image Tours of Key Points of Interest found along the Oregon Coast.
Coast Photo Gallery - Central Oregon Coast Lighthouses
Yaquina Head Lighthouse - First Order Fresnel Lens
The lighthouse tour available at the Yaquina Head Lighthouse starts at the entrance into the oil house doorway. The tour begins with general lighthouse information and interpretive displays about the oil storage room, focusing on the original lard oil that was utilized during the first 14 years of operation. The tour heads down the hallway and leads into the rotunda section of the tower. The arched doorway at the rotunda entrance provides a perspective on the width size of the cavity-wall designed construction used to build the brick lighthouse tower. Within the rotunda, an iron stairwell starts the ascent up into the circular tower. The stairway system includes a total climb of 104 stairs that end up at the watch room and features four main sections of spiral stairs with each section ending at a landing area. The watch room features interpretive information about the lantern and is the waiting area for climbing up the additional six steps to peek at the automated light system now in use and the first order Fresnel Lens. The Fresnel Lens used in the Yaquina Head Lighthouse is a masterpiece of work built in 1868 by Barbier & Fenestre Constructeurs in Paris, France. The lens includes a total number of 258 prisms and lens sections and is made out of “crown” glass with a green tint based on the materials used to manufacture the lenses. The first order Fresnel Lens is the largest size within the lens classification as made in France, and the glass prisms are mounted into brass frames with putty. Up to 1939, the light source was fixed with a steady beam of light and then a new signature light pattern was implemented based on a pattern of two seconds on, two seconds off, two seconds on and fourteen seconds off. The light source has changed over time with different technologies starting with lard oil first, second with mineral oil/kerosene, third with an incandescent oil vapor lamp and then an electric lamp. Today, the electric 1,000 watt clear lamp runs day and night and features a primary lamp and a secondary one for backup purposes.
Photo of the ocean views looking out over the Yaquina Head Coastline from inside the lantern house of the Yaquina Head Lighthouse, accessible as part of the interpretive tour through a peek into the lantern room from the stairwell that leads up from the watch room.
Photo of the automated light source used by the Coast Guard in the Yaquina Head Lighthouse and monitored by the Coast Guard’s North Bend Oregon Light Station through the use of their Aid Control Monitoring System.
Photo of the magnificent first order Fresnel Lens installed in the lantern house at the Yaquina Head Lighthouse along with the automated light source utilized by the Coast Guard allowing visibility of the light beam at approximately 19 miles out to sea based on a signature pattern of two seconds on-two seconds off-two seconds on-fourteen seconds off.


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