DO RAY Nobby Reflector repair

R

Richard Lorenz

Senior Member
I want to put an old DO RAY NOBBY reflector on the back of my pickup truck. This reflector has a 5 inch diameter steel housing containing 37 red glass marbles 3/8 inch diameter that do the reflecting.

My housing is rusted and I would like to disassemble it for refinishing. Does anyone know what holds the glass beads in place inside of the housing? If I take off the back will the insides fall apart? Thanks, Richard Lorenz
 
I have a similar reflector someplace, and it has the rear cover riveted on. If I removed the rear cover the marbles would all be loose.

If the inside of the back plate was painted white or silver, it would seem like the marbles would make better reflctors. I haven't looked at mine in years, so I don't know how it was originally painted.
 
Painting the inside may help, but is not the best way to increase reflectivity of gigantic glass beads like marbles. For best reflectivity you would need to silver or paint the back half of the glass surfaces themselves. Think of cheap rhinestones. Colored glass, the back half is painted silver.
 
Do a search on ebay for "sign marbles". It will show you what is inside a reflector. Not really a marble.
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I took my DO RAY apart and found a solid glass piece with a fiber pad between it and the steel backing. Each "nob" on the front had a larger semicircular bulb shape behind it that was silver plated to form a focused mirror. The patent date was January 12, 1858. No details available on-line about the patent, but it probably concerned the silver plate. Someone asked who had a light in 1858 that needed reflecting. The answer might have been that high-quality horse-drawn coaches had kerosene lamps with a focusing lens on the front. Pretty dim, but the driver could see what the horses were doing.
 
I restore om and took it apart to better clean the "marbles". It turned out they weren't marbles at all but were a solid glass molding with the silver painted on the back. I have to believe that it is an attempt at mirroring. I was able to get it clean and it looks and reflects beautifully.
 
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