One light in fluorescent lamp randomly starts

On Thursday, 12 October 2017 18:57:39 UTC+1, pf...@aol.com wrote:

On Thursday, October 12, 2017 at 1:26:37 PM UTC-4, tabby wrote:

US fluorescent lighting is different to UK in many ways. All our historic switchstart ballasts work fine with T12, T8 and a lot of LED tubes.


That would explain a lot of your attitude. But, your electrical power is, on average, 50% more costly than power in the US - one would think that energy efficiency would would be of greater concern to you than it seems to be. We operate a 464 square meter center-hall colonial built in 1890 for US$239/month (180 GBP). And we heat in the winter and cool in the summer. This includes heat, hot water, electricity, cooking, drying, and municipal water and sewer. Yes, we use a clothes line in the summer. But energy is dirt-cheap in the US relative to the rest of the world - not to suggest we waste it, but the only incandescent lamps we own are in the chandeliers. They too, are slowly giving way to LEDs.

Peter Wieck
Melrose Park, PA

At the risk of stating the obvious, a person that buys an ancient piece of lighting isn't looking for the peak possible energy efficiency. It already has linear fluorescent lights so is quite efficient anyway. Iron ballasts on a small low power light only used some of the time consume a trivial amount.

If the OP were desperate to save another ÂŁ1 a year for some reason he could always fit LED tubes with a wire fitted to short the ballasts. I can't see any compelling reason to though.


NT

 

[pfjw@aol.com]

Yabbut...

I take the Senator Everett McKinley Dirksen attitude: A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it is real money!

We actually had honorable politicians mores-so-than-not back in the day. Sure, they still screwed by the numbers and stole what they could - but they also took their jobs fairly seriously. And it was DDE that created the term "Military Industrial Complex", and as a warning, not a description.

An honest politician is one who, when he is bought, will stay bought.

Simon Cameron
US financier & politician (1799 - 1889)

Peter Wieck
Melrose Park PA

 

[petrus bitbyter]

|schreef in bericht
news:9b35882f-69d0-4d6d-accf-444fd425fd5c@googlegroups.com...
|
|I have this old fluorescent desk lamp from the 60s at the latest that I'm
fixing. It weighs a ton, has been passed down from my father-in-law, and it
just retro-|cool. According to him it's always worked, except the F15-T8
bulbs are possibly original and very worn out, and only one bulb ever
lights. I've been told this |has always been a problem, and holding the
start button for a long time will sometimes get both to start. I've never
been successful but I don't like this and |want to fix it.
|
|Upon reverse engineering it I come up with this schematic (it's rough,
drawn in Paint!):
|
|
|https://imgur.com/a/0YYKV
|
|I'm no fluorescent light expert, but how the start button is connected to
both lamps seems odd to me, a little like directly paralleling LEDs or neon
bulbs after |the limit resistor. If I disconnect one bulb, the remaining
always starts. I doubt this design would ever work very well....would it?
|
|If I manually start each light by disconnecting the start button wires and
momentarily shorting the two pins at opposite ends of each lamp, they each
start |right up. My plan is to modify it with a DPDT relay with 120VAC coil
so the start button drives the coil, and each lamp has it's own set of relay
contacts. I'm |sure this will work, but.....WTF with the original design?
Is this normal? I doubt it's even been modified, and see no good way to fix
it without adding a relay |or a multipole start switch.
|
|I'm a little surprised to see some that seems this hokey (to me) in
something this old.

In a similar case, replacing the startbutton worked for me. Still don't know
how or why. (A little frustrating.)

Otherwise, seperate both lamps + ballasts and use two startbuttons.

petrus bitbyter

 

[Ron D.]

I have a funny feeling somebody used the wrong switch. I believe what you do manually, is what the switch does.

So, replace the switch with one designed to turn on a florescent light.

The desk lamp I have with that starting system is a single tube. Eons ago, the bas got painted and a new switch installed.

See http://www.edisontechcenter.org/Fluorescent.html for operation.

Here's another place to look. http://www.egaynor.com/edwin_gaynor_lampholders/666.htm These use two ballasts for a two bulb system.