My dad and I went here there and everywhere looking for a can of Krylon Dove Gray paint (no luck) and i found these at a local hardware store and bought them all (9) for a dollar each. Oddly enough they have 400W Sylvania MH lamps in OLD looking sleeve, though i passed on them since i don't have a fixture for them. I'll be testing them tonight on my grandpa's F90T17 fixture. How old are these?
The WatchDog brand has been used for quite a long time. Those have probably been made in the 60s or 70s, but I'm not 100% sure.
But this is good stuff! Manual reset starters should have been the standard for preheat fluorescent lighting, since it trips and opens the circuit if a tube is burnt out. It'd have made preheat fluorescents even more reliable than they were already.
Cool! These were on the shelve for quite some time then! I tested them all in my grandpa's T17 and they all work. Some take a long time to turn on the tube though. I gave him one for letting me test them. He already had 3 so now he has four spares and two spare tubes.
Thanks. I figured i'd get them since i'll be inherriting those two T17 lights (it's beeen confirmed by my great-aunt and my grandpa). I'm also going to see if i can get the 3-lamp half-piper and the four T12 lights with the plunger sockets as well as a few F20T12 preheat lights my great-aunt has. My great-aunt said i can have any light fixtures i want as long as i put a working one in its place. I won't be doing that until i get my own place or if she decides to sell the house (whichever is first).
I'm not sure about the preheat reflector strip lights that my cousin's grandpa has/had though since i've never asked about them. I have no room for any fluorescent fixtures ATM so i don't want to ask yet. I have asked to relamp them and replace the starters but no answer yet. I disconnected the non-working ones to save the ballasts for now by pulling the chain switch and wrapping it around the fixture so no one can reach it.
No one really ever goes out into the garage anyways so i guess she finds no need for me to fix them though I'd really love to see them all working again. Only one lamp out of six works properly. One doesn't light at all, two strobe a lot, and two strobe at the ends.
Thanks! Do they still make FS-85 and FS-850 starters? Is there a difference between the two besides the reset button? What does that reset button do anyways?
nice find!
if the lamp goes EOL after a few flashes the starter heats up enough and pushes the button out,its spring loaded to break the circuit, then when lamp is replaced you simply press the button and new lamp lights up!
So the button does the same thing as physically removing the starter? What happens if you press the button while the lamp is already on and isn't EOL? Will it just restart or does nothing happen? Are the ones with the button interchangable with regular ones? I noticed these have two full size pins and twotiny pins on the base.
yes it is, I have an air thermal and regular glow bottle FS-4 starters when lamp EOL it makes a click and it stops trying to start the bad lamp, as if it were removed...even if power is turned off and back on it remains off until button is pressed.
nothing happens when lamp is working and the button is pressed
they are interchangeable with regular starters, but since these watchdog ones provide protection the ballast is saved from damage and starter life is much longer since lamp can't cause it to get "stuck"( bimetal strip in starter glowbottle welded together)
as far as the small pins...I don't know, my sylvania FS-84 starters have it too along with reset button
Hmm, come to think of it I guess these came out of a ten pack of starters, I wonder if the owner was surprised when you came in and bought all nine since they were probably sitting there for a while.
Yeah it was in a long narrow cardboard box. I was initially buying 2. The guy had no idea what to charge me for them since there was no part number. They had been sitting there for so long. Then i came back with 7 more and left. I saw a couple of clear blue starters but i passed on them since i used up my $10 that i brought with me. There was a couple of maybe 70s or 80s looking HPS black plastic yard lights in a box for $45 and change each too. The guy was selling oldish looking 400Y Metalarcs too. I didn't ask what price though. He said he has 20. No MV lamps though i did see a vintage F25T12 sylvania with the 70s-1980 etch.
Ahh the classic "where did you manage to pull that out of and I have no clue what I'm going to charge you for them" face.
I might have picked up a yardlight if they were special (like w/ coated lamp, BT 25 lamp etc), and probably a Metalarc too if they were vintage and probably one of those clear starters too.
Now that Vince and Jace have confirmed that i can run a MH lamp on my MV M-400 without harm to the ballast i might get one. I'll definetly buy a ton of starters and some starter socket they had. Most of the fluoescent tubes were modern though and so were the CFLS and incandescents. I think i saw either an HO or VHO ballast too but i don't really remember....
Oddly HO ballasts are as common as Gulls in my area, I know Lowe's, HD, RONA, and most small hardware stores sell them. HD and Lowe's have electronic HO ballasts too. I guess it's cause Canada is on average colder.
My grandpa could use some HO lights in his auto shop. The 8ft T12 slimlines take forever to "warm up". The F40T12 troffers in his office take a while too but you probably wouldn't notice since i think only two lamps out of at least 8 work. One troffer is totally out while the other has two lamps working. I'm not sure if there's a third troffer or not... There's a 40W T12 2-lamp industrial strip (with the reflector) in the bathroom with one lamp working. I think it's preheat but not positive. If it is preheat, it's the only one that is. The rest are 8ft slimlines and 4ft RS troffers. I've talked to him about retrofitting his lights since he mentioned replacing them but he'll probably never get around to replacing or retrofitting all of his lights anyways. He barely has time to do anything since he's always up to his neck in work that has to be done.
I have a HO 8 footer in my garage and it's nice and bright during the summer, takes a while to warm up during the winter though cause all I could find when I installed it were energy saver Altos. I plan to replace those with full wattage Sylvanias when they fail though. I also have a couple F48T12/HO strips floating around in my collection too.
Anyways if you're retrofitting from SL to HO make sure the ballast channel is deep enough to fit the HO ballast if not you'll have to find a shallow case HO ballast (not sure if they make those for 8 footers) or use a electronic HO ballast.
I was thinking of trying to get him to use F96T8 lamps with ballasts like these. The only issue is that some of his fixtures are two lamps and others are for one lamp. Can the ballast i linked operate one lamp if one of the blue wires is capped?
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But this is good stuff! Manual reset starters should have been the standard for preheat fluorescent lighting, since it trips and opens the circuit if a tube is burnt out. It'd have made preheat fluorescents even more reliable than they were already.
I'm not sure about the preheat reflector strip lights that my cousin's grandpa has/had though since i've never asked about them. I have no room for any fluorescent fixtures ATM so i don't want to ask yet. I have asked to relamp them and replace the starters but no answer yet. I disconnected the non-working ones to save the ballasts for now by pulling the chain switch and wrapping it around the fixture so no one can reach it.
No one really ever goes out into the garage anyways so i guess she finds no need for me to fix them though I'd really love to see them all working again. Only one lamp out of six works properly. One doesn't light at all, two strobe a lot, and two strobe at the ends.
if the lamp goes EOL after a few flashes the starter heats up enough and pushes the button out,its spring loaded to break the circuit, then when lamp is replaced you simply press the button and new lamp lights up!
nothing happens when lamp is working and the button is pressed
they are interchangeable with regular starters, but since these watchdog ones provide protection the ballast is saved from damage and starter life is much longer since lamp can't cause it to get "stuck"( bimetal strip in starter glowbottle welded together)
as far as the small pins...I don't know, my sylvania FS-84 starters have it too along with reset button
I do wish they made HPS ignitors like this where they were easily removable and resetable
I might have picked up a yardlight if they were special (like w/ coated lamp, BT 25 lamp etc), and probably a Metalarc too if they were vintage and probably one of those clear starters too.
Anyways if you're retrofitting from SL to HO make sure the ballast channel is deep enough to fit the HO ballast if not you'll have to find a shallow case HO ballast (not sure if they make those for 8 footers) or use a electronic HO ballast.