Author Topic: Automatic Reset Fluorescent Lamp Starters  (Read 2122 times)
Mr. Orthosilicate
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Automatic Reset Fluorescent Lamp Starters « on: September 15, 2019, 07:53:50 PM » Author: Mr. Orthosilicate
Has anyone ever seen or used automatic reset starters? If so, how did they behave compared to a manual reset starter?
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sol
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Re: Automatic Reset Fluorescent Lamp Starters « Reply #1 on: September 15, 2019, 10:37:27 PM » Author: sol
I have some although not in use at the moment.

Good lamp behaviour : same as any glow starter.
Bad lamp behaviour : blinks like any standard glow starter with EOL lamp upon power up. About two minutes of flashing shuts them off (a bimetal switch with resistor cuts them out). When turned off for a couple of minutes, they start again until they shut off.

If the EOL lamp is changed very quickly with power on, the starter remains in cutout mode until the circuit is turned off for a couple of minutes to make them reset.

In short, they reset any time power is cut off, and reactivate every time the circuit is energised, until the bad lamp is replaced.
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Medved
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Re: Automatic Reset Fluorescent Lamp Starters « Reply #2 on: September 16, 2019, 03:47:32 AM » Author: Medved
I wont use them, because such behavior stresses them again and again every time the lights are switched ON, so you have to replace them with each lamp in a similar fashion as standard starters, yet they are more expensive.
The manual reset stay OFF till you are really replacing the lamp, so there is no stress on them (except once, when the cut off was triggered).

Of course electronic starters are a different story: There is nothing to wear out during the failed lamp starting attempt, so they may stay forever...
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nogden
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Nelson Ogden


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Re: Automatic Reset Fluorescent Lamp Starters « Reply #3 on: September 17, 2019, 11:34:21 AM » Author: nogden
I also only use manual reset starters. However, I found one application where auto reset might be better. A museum ship I occasionally help with has 2' preheat lights with manual reset starters. Sometimes, due to low voltage conditions or excessively low temperatures, the lamps will take a long time to start, tripping the cutout. Then you have to go around to all the lights and manually reset them. They find this quite annoying!
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Medved
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Re: Automatic Reset Fluorescent Lamp Starters « Reply #4 on: September 19, 2019, 02:26:10 AM » Author: Medved
In such conditions I would rather use the electronic ones - their benefit is, there is nothing stressed when the voltage is too low to sustain the lamps.
But still wonder: How it comes there are such undervoltages? There is insufficient generator power on the ship, or the generator is regularly allowed to run out of fuel or what?
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nogden
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Nelson Ogden


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Re: Automatic Reset Fluorescent Lamp Starters « Reply #5 on: September 19, 2019, 10:01:40 AM » Author: nogden
Its a museum ship on shore power. Trouble is, they have several hundred feet of under-rated cord connecting the ship to shore power!
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Medved
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Re: Automatic Reset Fluorescent Lamp Starters « Reply #6 on: September 19, 2019, 11:55:25 AM » Author: Medved
Its a museum ship on shore power. Trouble is, they have several hundred feet of under-rated cord connecting the ship to shore power!

I see...
Then I would really go for the electronic starters (S10e or S2e from Philips,...).
Mainly to make sure the lamps get restarted with proper preheat time, so they wont wear out that quickly.
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