I installed this one : https://www.lighting-gallery.net/gallery/displayimage.php?album=5202&pos=288&pid=173786 by my neighbors fire pit/party area .  I found it on the side of the road still in the box where it had apparently fell off the back of a contractor's truck !

 I start work at 5 A.M. and I'm just amazed by the number of people who walk in the door either texting or talking on the phone!! What could possibly be so important that who need to communicate with someone that early ? 

https://www.ebay.com/usr/francuacr75?_trksid=p4429486.m3561.l2559
ebay seller with hundreds of SOX lanterns and has disassembled many and is the ONLY source I know of but airfreight will make your timeline

I am certain you would definitely notice you are carrying 180cm tube, as it is *extremely* bulky even compared to 150cm one...

i’ll update you tomorrow since i don’t have it between my hands now. it also may be a strange tube since the rack were i found it said “85W 150cm” so it may be a strange size but i just assumed it was a mislabeling but i didn’t have time to check whether it’s 180cm or really 150cm (in that warehouse multiple things are mislabeled, such as ballasts labeled as rheostats)

thats very interesting! I hope you do an upload of it, as mentioned I have never seen a Sylvania 85W only 6ft tube, all have been 75W/85W etc I am quite pleased to hear I am wrong in my assumption here!


and just to confirm you are sure the tube if 6ft long and not 8ft long? 8ft 85W tubes also existed here (but they have very different electrical parameters (do not run one of those on an 80W mercury choke!)

This topic has been moved to Wanted.

https://www.lighting-gallery.net/index.php?topic=16478.0

I've seen some more rural properties with stuff like Sylvania/Powerlite Twistpaks or the RAB Thorn Gamma 6 clone. I think actual streetlights and yard lights are more common though. Even seen some gumballs and clamshells.


Most suburban homes have something like a standard incandescent/LED posttop instead. One in my neighbourhood has a HPS posttop in what looks like a standard residential fixture. Maybe he has a postline ballast.

it’s a british one i would say, normal G13 endcaps and only rated 85W (the model is F85W/CW)
thank you all for the replies fortunately i both have 36/40W fluorescent and 80W mercury choke

hi, i’ve got a Sylvania 85w T12 6ft fluorescent tube (don’t know how it ended up here in italy) and i was wondering how can i run it since i don’t have any specific ballasts for it. thank you very much

you say 85W T12 6ft tube, but there are 2 distinct types of that tube, so I have to ask which type is it?

there is the US F72T12/HO Rapid-start tube with R17d caps, and then there is the British 85W 6ft T12 Bi pin tube primarily designed for switch start and SRS circuits (the IEC spec sheets dont even list a 3.6V RS spec of that tube)

the 85W T12 6ft bi-pin tube is designed to run off an 80W mercury lamp/5ft 80W T12 ballast, so thats what I would use if you have it, if you dont have such a ballast then as RRK says a 2x36W/40W 4ft chokes ganged together will work well, you will likely need an S16 starter, a traditional S10 type starter might keep re-triggering (tho you can just remove it once the tube cathodes have come up to temp)

the US tube is designed for rapid start circuits mainly, so if you have a suitable cathode heating transformer thats what I would use in conjunction with an aforementioned 80W choke or 2x36W chokes (the british and US tubes both run at 800mA more or less) a switch starter will work, but as RRK mentioned it might be a bit sluggish to get going because of the low resistance 3.6V cathodes

would I be right in saying you have a US spec tube? I say this because, the British 6ft T12 was fairly quickly re-rated to 75W and thus most 6ft T12s are 75W or dual rated 75W/85W, and I have never seen a Sylvania T12 6ft 85W *only* tube in British spec (by the time Sylvania became a known entity here in the UK 85W only tubes had mostly ceased to exist)