The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « on: May 18, 2013, 08:00:53 AM » Author: dor123
Based on this picture of Iwasaki HPS retrofit for CWA mercury ballasts , which displayed a suspicious wire around the arctube (In additional to the Ferro-Electric Capacitor itself, and the ressistors), which a member of LG, said me that that wire is a starting probe and is connected to the FEC itself, I can't longer know if the FEC "ignitor" of Iwasaki HPS lamps, is a real HV ignitor, that sends pulses to the arctube, like external ignitors/glow starters/snap (Thermal) starters, or just an improvement of the starting coils of penning start HPS lamps, that allow regular xenon HPS lamps to be ignited directly from the 220-240V mains (In case of a lamp for the european market)/CWA mercury ballast OCV (In case of a lamp for the american/japanese market), without the need to replace the xenon with argon-neon buffer. Any answers please!
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	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #2 on: May 18, 2013, 03:05:07 PM » Author: dor123
So the ignitor sends a HV pulses to the first electrodes, that transfers to the starting probe, and the starting probe strike the arctube through capacitance?
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I"m don't speak English well, and rely on online translating to write in this site.
Please forgive me if my choice of my words looks like offensive, while that isn't my intention.

I only working with the international date format (dd.mm.yyyy).

I lives in Israel, which is a 220-240V, 50hz country.

	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #4 on: May 18, 2013, 03:38:55 PM » Author: dor123
So this is a compromise between a HV ignitor and a starting probe: There is a starting coil around the arctube, but instead of being feeded directly by the mains voltage (As in penning start HPS lamps), it is feeded by a HV source.
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I"m don't speak English well, and rely on online translating to write in this site.
Please forgive me if my choice of my words looks like offensive, while that isn't my intention.

I only working with the international date format (dd.mm.yyyy).

I lives in Israel, which is a 220-240V, 50hz country.

	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #5 on: May 18, 2013, 05:00:53 PM » Author: Medved
The FEC ignitor generate similar pulses as the glowbottle or thermal switches. The high capacitance at low voltage cause the ballast current to rise, when the capacitance drop at the elevated voltage, the ballast current then cause the voltage spike. The antenna wire is there to allow the use even the harder-to-start fills (Xenon,...), so allow the design to be optimized more towards the higher efficacy. Functionally similar antennas (but their exact design differ maker from maker) are used even with lamps intended to operate on a standard external HV ignitor (no self starting), with the same goal: To allow the use of harder to start arctube fill mix.
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	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #6 on: May 19, 2013, 03:30:40 AM » Author: dor123
Quote from: Medved on May 18, 2013, 05:00:53 PM The antenna wire is there to allow the use even the harder-to-start fills (Xenon,...), so allow the design to be optimized more towards the higher efficacy. Functionally similar antennas (but their exact design differ maker from maker) are used even with lamps intended to operate on a standard external HV ignitor (no self starting), with the same goal: To allow the use of harder to start arctube fill mix. Reminds me of the idea of the starting antennas of 300 torr xenon "Super" HPS lamps, which assists to the external ignitor in ignition (300 torr have a higher starting voltage than 80 torr xenon of regular HPS lamp). Wondering why this starting wire isn't used in internal glow starter HPS lamps to allow the use of pure xenon instead of the less efficient argon+xenon(?) penning, and instead, the idiots EU wants to ban these lamps.
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I"m don't speak English well, and rely on online translating to write in this site.
Please forgive me if my choice of my words looks like offensive, while that isn't my intention.

I only working with the international date format (dd.mm.yyyy).

I lives in Israel, which is a 220-240V, 50hz country.

	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #7 on: May 19, 2013, 05:13:11 AM » Author: Medved
Quote from: dor123 on May 19, 2013, 03:30:40 AM Wondering why this starting wire isn't used in internal glow starter HPS lamps to allow the use of pure xenon instead of the less efficient argon+xenon(?) penning, and instead, the idiots EU wants to ban these lamps. The "ban" does not adress "selfstarting lamps" in general, but "lamps with efficacy lower than...". That mean the Penning mixture lamps are out because they are of lower efficacy. The other selfstarting lamps may still fulfill the requirements and so could be sold, but they all are quite complex, so expensive to make. So they may run on a bit cheaper gear, but the lamps would be way more expensive. In that respec, the cost advantage for the customers is gone - why to buy expensive lamps, when investing $4 into a fixture for a cheap superimposed ignitor mean you could use basic cheap HPS, so save at least $2 on each lamp or have even the higher efficacy as a bonus. So it is the economy, what puts the more complex self starting lamps out of the game...
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	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #8 on: May 19, 2013, 06:35:30 AM » Author: dor123
in this picture , a member said that all HPS lamps which aren't "Super" HPS lamps (Ie.. HPS with 300 torr xenon and a starting antenna), will be banned, including the standard HPS lamp which uses an external ignitor. Here is a link from Osram website , about the ban. The primary reason for the ban, is to force people to buy LED, which is 10 times less efficient than HPS lamps.
« Last Edit: May 19, 2013, 06:37:47 AM by dor123 »		Logged

I"m don't speak English well, and rely on online translating to write in this site.
Please forgive me if my choice of my words looks like offensive, while that isn't my intention.

I only working with the international date format (dd.mm.yyyy).

I lives in Israel, which is a 220-240V, 50hz country.

	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #10 on: May 19, 2013, 02:51:11 PM » Author: Medved
There are two things: At first, the MV fixtures (generally) belong to the older ones, most of them quite close to their EOL (they disintegrate from corrosion,...). At second: On all most popular MV wattages (80W, 125W) you can run the HPS lamps (70W, 100W). The 70W won't run on full power, but the power would be quite close (~85%; on 0.8A instead of 0.95A). Moreover as MV replacements are only the 110W (instead of MV125W), 210W (MV250W) and 350W (MV400W), what I haven't heard about quite a long time. They were popular here for short time only on places, where their color was not a problem. But these fixtures become very soon replaced by the regular HPS. And on places, where the color was important, were still used the MV's, or the fixtures were converted to either PL-L (the "cheap" way) or the MH (the "luxury" way). The selfstarting 70W are not intended for the MV ballast, but do require the regular 1A HPS choke (they only do not require an ignitor, that is the only difference from the standard HPS gear). As I understood, your utilities use these in place of 80W MV (and I guess you are reffering to what they could use when the selfstarting ones won't be available anymore), so that mean underdriving them at ~85%. Well, not big deal for the lamp, you won't recognize any difference without an accurate instruments. And there the regular 70W HPS would perform exactly the same (well, actually better, or for lower cost), when an ignitor would be installed there (simple series ignitor would do the job well).
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	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #11 on: May 20, 2013, 05:36:22 PM » Author: BG101
Is the colour any better with standard HPS lamps compared to those with an internal starter? I would like to get hold of a coated elliptical HPS lamp without internal starter for comparison but haven't seen any so far, just clear tubular ones. BG
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	Re: The FEC ignitor: Is this a real HV ignitor or just an auxiliary starting device? « Reply #13 on: May 20, 2013, 06:07:59 PM » Author: Medved
I think at least Osram make the NAV-E 50W and NAV-E 70W in the coated finish even, even for the electronic ignitor (so no internal starter, maybe only the antenna, but for sure need a HV ignitor). The selfstarting types bear the "/I" suffix in the designation. The MV retrofits (110, 210 and 350W) are all selfstarting even without the suffix.
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