My Collection: AC Ford AC810

The AC Ford AC810 was an obscure side-entry lantern which could run 80W-125W MBF/U or 60W-200W GLS. This one was purchased from eBay on 7th June 2026, it arrived a week later on the 16th of June, when it was unboxed and assessed. The lantern had never actually been used before. This was one of three being sold as NOS.

This is an AC Ford example, but I used to have another which was cast with the older "FORDAC" name.

The clip is at the street end of the lantern, and the bowl hinges towards the spigot. This is where the problems started, I noticed that the clip wasn't aligned. Then, at the back, I didn't notice that the hinge hadn't been rounded off properly, leaving essentially a right angle where the curve was supposed to be. This prevented the lantern opening fully, and eventually the hinge broke as a result. It was glued back on a few days later and the issue was fixed.

The bowl is incredible on this example. It is very rare to find one of these polycarbonate ones nowadays that is fully clear.

The bowl is fixed into the ring by four screws (which also had to be replaced, as all of the original ones were bent, and one snapped).

New gasket was also placed in the lantern as the old one had essentially turned to dust. It did clean up excellently though, I think you'll agree!

Near the lamp-holder are the positions for lamp-types cast into the canopy. On top, 150W-200W GLS, and on the bottom, 80W-125W MBF/U. In later years, these lanterns were also sold for 50W-70W SON.

Here are some comparison photos between this one and the older 1960s FORDAC AC810. There are only a few differences here. Most apparent is the extra lamp-holder position for 100W GLS on the 1960s example.

The grub screws are actual bolts on the older version, but were later changed to headless bolts.

And then the name cast into the top is different, as previously mentioned. Despite the fact that they look different sizes, they're both the same, just the lack of a bowl on the older one makes it appear much smaller.

The AC Ford AC810 lit with an 80W MBF/U lamp for the first time: