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I used to work on a large piece of German Equipment made in the early 70s.

The control panel switch for the lighting was labeled "Luminaires"
It seems that the British IEE's adoption of luminaire was to bring us into line with some supposed European standard. The 15th Edition of our Wiring Regs. in 1981 was the first which was modeled on a common European format.

I'm still waiting for somebody to come up with any sort of logical explanation for adopting luminaire to "conform" with European nomenclature when we all speak different languages anyway..... [Linked Image]

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In the old days of engines, that had distributor caps, the mechanics all refered to the capacitor as a condensor.
Or a condenser. [Linked Image]

That's the old name which was in use before capacitor. If you look back at any early radio manual you'll find that it refers to condensers rather than capacitors.

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There is also a tendency umong many to call an engine a motor.
That's not so common in British usage. Over here though, motor is sometimes used as a colloquialism for a complete car (i.e. "motor car"), e.g.

"He just bought himself a nice motor."

The usage is somewhat regional and often regarded as rather "downmarket" though.