It will try to start a lamp and after around so many seconds ( such as 30 ) it will stop. It will not attempt a restart unless power is removed for a few minutes. 

Would these starters be a good choice?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/5-Fluorescent-Light-Ballast-Starters-Westromatic-FS-4NB-/321130610518?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4ac4e03f56

Automatic reset - Does it mean that if i leave it energized with EOL lamp it will nce in a time wake up, flash some more and go back off ?

They reset, when the power is cycled. The simplest form would be a PTC in series with the glowbottle. A more complex a contact, what disconnect the glowbottle when heated by it and connect a small heater resistor instead. Then as long as the power is applied, the heater resistor keep the contact in the "fault" position. When the power is interrupted, the thing cool down, the contact connect the glowbottle back and the whole thing is ready for a new starting attempt.

My brother figured out that liquid camp fuel (white gas) takes the tar off of surfaces very easily. Some scraping was also necessary to get larger chunks off. Everything is nice and clean now.

I  have never heard of that brand of starter, but they should be fine.

Here's a video of two of the fixtures working. I'm still waiting on the Valmont ballast to complete the third.

http://youtu.be/C6dd1mF6jKw

Nice video! Looks like you got the Westron starters. I got some too. They're metal cased but painted white interestingly enough. I'm definitely looking forward to pics in the gallery. Congrats again on the sweet find!

Actually I haven't bought the Westron starters yet. The white ones you see are early-mid 2000's Sylvania starters I had sitting around. I just need two more starters to have a complete set for all the lights. Gonna take lots of pics and do a better video once the last ballast gets here. I'm glad these things are finally going to work because I've spent way more than I wanted to on them. Now to find a place for them all... it's too bad I bought a bunch of electronic lights for my basement just weeks before finding these beauties.

Sounds good. BTW, as for the broken glass diffuser and missing third one, I've often seen these glass diffusered preheat troffers take 4 glass tiles as diffusers and those too also show up on ebay from time to time, though the price on them may vary. I will let you know if I come across any, and as for the electronic fixtures you bought, you could always sell them on craigslist or install them if you move and want to take these fixtures with you.

Realistically I can't replace the electronic lights with these preheat ones because I have a total of 10 4-lamp T8 troffers in my basement plus a single 2-lamp rapid start T12 fixture, and only three preheaters. I am, however, running 3 electronic T12/T8 strip lights over the work areas that these oldies may replace. The strip lights are $20 Home Depot cheapos that I bought to replace some Lights of America shop lights that were even worse.

The moment you have all been waiting for.

http://youtu.be/gPO25a-fM-Q

I ended up not going for the Westron starters and instead grabbed a 2-pack of Philips Advance starters at Lowe's. The starters themselves are labeled Cooper and look pretty cheap, but work great and give off a nice purple glow upon startup. These are the two starters right beside each other in the horizontally-placed fixture. A few of the old Sylvania starters that came with the lights are really slow to start the lamp, so they may be replaced at some point. For now, I'm just happy to have these unusual vintage fixtures restored to proper working condition.