Fluorescent Lamp Ballasts
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- Опубликовано: 5 фев 2012
- How ballasts work and how they have changed from the 1940s. Magnetic ballasts to electronic ballasts used for fluorescent lamp fixtures. We look at the insides of the 'brick' ballasts of the 1940s, see the step-up transformer, chokes and capacitor. This video is part of the lighting project by the Edison Tech Center and the IEEE. It is an introduction to what ballasts are and a very general description of how they work. You can learn more about ballasts on the website: www.EdisonTechCenter.org/Fluorescent.html
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If you are a nerd of live with a nerd this is a very instructive video. The EE guy I live with is obsessed with ballasts. I had never heard of the thing before. Now I have at least a rudimentary idea. Thanks for your effort. I amazed by your obvious enthusiasm.
Very well expained. Liked it especially because you tore a simple one apart to show what's actually inside.
my school is kinda old. its from the 1970's it doesnt have any simuline or rapid start but it has 4 foot 2 bulb preheat lights in the study skills room. its fun watching them start.
I often wondered how fluorescents could strike on 120 volts. Now I know! Thanks to the step up transformer.
UK and European ballasts are simpler for all sizes as they're on 240 volts. Thank you!
@@joshuawilson1544 You're right. That's just how they work. But I'd read somewhere that 120 volt supplies were trickier than 230 volt supplies.
I like your comparison of the new products, compared with the ones they are 'superseding' it is so that people born yesterday, don't know how efficient things were in the olden day.
Young people can't see that modern things solve modern problems. In the olden days thing were not so competitive either with comodities ( more lights) or companies wishing to cut power bills (by using compact flourescent lamps or LED etc. to reduce electricity bills). There was more money about and there was less asthetic lighting (in homes; one had a single lamp in the center of the room and that was about all.
It is possible to have development without improvement or and change without improvement.
Have A Nice Day Rick.
Yeah preheat lamps are always fun to watch...
especially when there is much more than one
considering the fact that you get the classic
delay affect with each start up.
Answered all of my questions, thank you.
Good history and explanation! Thanks!
I love his explanations and way of teaching very understandable and simple. Actually just took out some old archaic ballasts and I was curious on what's inside them I'm going to keep them just in case. 😎👍
Another fantastic video! So much information in one video! Thank you for sharing your knowledge and experience!!! :-D
You referenced "When they're cared for" how would one care for a light ballast? Good informative video. Thanks
To "care for" a fluorescent lamp ballast would be to replace end-of-life fluorescent tubes in the circuit immediately after they fail, so as not to overheat the step-up windings in the ballast which will continually try to start a lamp (or lamps) that can no longer operate properly. Allowing a ballast to overheat can cause its internal components to fail, resulting in rapid failure of new lamps, or the fixture cutting in and out (as the ballast will continuously overheat due to its windings being compromised).
Great overview thanks.
I'm actually very interested in understanding how the various parts of the early ballasts (including the starting compensator and capacitor) all worked in conjunction. It would be great if you could make a video detailing some of these aspects.
On a side note I also have have an old style GE ballast like the one you showed in this video but I cannot find any diagrams of how it's supposed to be hooked up, If you have any resources on that I would be very appreciative.
I started to use 4foot LEDs in my fixtures . And I must say I love how they light up my kitchen .
Thx for the explanation. Never knew what was in them
I sure hope that you don't throw any of these away. These are worth a lot to museums.
This is great info. Thank you for making this video. I was always curious on what this was. Now I know :)
thank you! very informative..
Very good!
I’m pretty sure the brick ballast is what caused the lights in my grandparents basement to start smoking. One day when we were over there, smoke just started pouring out one of the fixtures and the fire department was called. They looked at it and said the ballast had overheated. It didn’t catch fire though which was good. They’re house was older, built in the mid 50s. It was pretty scary and they never used those particular lights again.
@EdisonTechCenter, I thought this was an awesome
video though. There's info in this video that I did
not know, so I definitely like it. I've subscribed.
What exactly did you learn from this video, noth?
Fascinating 😊
I have an 8 foot 4 Lamp neon light fixture very old I only have I think one or two lamps at work but the fixture works
2:50, at my high school in the wood shop area, we
had bulbs, sockets and fixtures very much similar
to this! They were high power factor rapid start
fixtures though, but I mistaken-ed them for
slimlines because of the sockets. The ceiling
(from what I can see) was very much similar
as well.
I must note that a ballast and a reactor are two different things. The one can generate high voltage emf in a pulse form, and the other can only limit ac current
Glad you told me this bc I was gonna run a bulb straight and was so worried that it was gonna just blow up😂
WHY WOULD YOU RUN STRAIGHT INTO A BULB?? its dangerous buddy. not just mercury but the glass itself.
I loved the accent !!
Great content...👍
yes i love his accent
very cool thanx mate for sharing ;-)
THUMBS UP*
Yes the trouble with electronics is they usually fail in the shorted mode. One or both of the inverter transistors shorts, puts straight DC through the transformer and up in smoke it goes. Of course there's no fuse inside so instead of just not lighting up anymore they put on a smoke show and sometimes flames.
An interesting thought for some installations is heat/ energy losses of light in a building. Since in the UK for example, the heat would contribute to heating the building so not really a loss at all...
Here in the Philippines our power line is 220 volts 60 Hz and if a 20 watts fluorescent lamp is running for an hour, the choke ballast (3:00) is too hot to touch. Some failed within few years.
@nothingbutlighting He personally prefers the preheat, that is his opinion, this video can bring some healthy debate on ballasts.
We have CFLs that start dim and pink-purple then slowly come up to brightness. Reminds me of Mercury vapor or Metal Halide bulbs warming up.
@Rick Delair fluorecent tubes are actualy low pressure mercury the high pressure mercury bulbs (mercury blended flourecent) are very similar
Mistake was made from above information, the correction......
CFL has higher light efficiency than traditional choke type ballast because less " iron loss and copper loss " from chokes. CFL uses 100KHz power, its output transformer is super small and contains very little turns of wire that its loss closes to nothing.
Forgot to mansion cold cathode fluorescent light ballast, no starter is needed,ballast supplies as high as 780Vac to light the tube.
It's great being in the UK and having 230V mains.
Interesting vid. Wondering- you mentioned that magnetic ballasts tend to last longer than electronic. What is the reason for this?
ive read all kinds of leg phase outs of the magnetic and cant find anyting if they well still make the magnetic for the 3ft and 2 ft fixture i just recently bought a used 3ft with the old magnetic ballast form universal made for two 30watt t12 lamps
Yes thats right,i was have too magnetic ballast that was old about from 1963,and stil work wthout problems,by manufacturer,ELEKTROKOVINA
Maribor ,slovenia ,yugoslavia.Wery good quality of ballasts and Fluorescent lamps and VTF mercury vapor lamps.
Ballasts man , don't scrap these , they are worth more to People interested in Lighting a Space
i know the 4ft got phased out do u think the 3ft magnetic ballast well be phased
About the CFL electronic ballast.... The big yellow taped thing is NOT a transformer. It is just a choke. First: it is marked 1.7mH and second... desolder it and check are they 2 or more windings.....
How do you properly care for an old magnetic ballast? Other than changing the lamps, what else is there to do?
Spend some quality time with it. Tell the ballast that it looks pretty. Dress it up and take it out to a quality restaurant and field the bill once in a while.
lol lol lol :-)
My aquarium lamp has a shitty ballast that breaks faster than the bulbs wear out? it is very expensive to replace so I’m thankful that LED has become so affordable
I have wondered if you can run rapid start or preheat lamps on slimline ballasts provided you change the sockets. It seems that striking the arc with high voltage alone as in the slimlines would work on any fluorescent lamp even ones with broken filaments.
In theory you could, as long as the wattages are the same, ex. a 40 watt, 4 footer is also made in instant start versions, but they are rare, if you use a typical 40 watt 4 footer, designed to run on rapid start or preheat, on an instant start ballast, it will start and run normally, but will have a very short lifespan, since the cathodes are not as rugged to withstand the high starting voltage. On the other hand an instant start lamp on a rapid start or preheat ballast will not light at all, since the cathodes are internally shorted and cannot be heated, and will likely damage the ballast.
i wonder if they will ever bring back some of the old mag ballast even with this next rule in 2014
I have rapid start magnetic ballasts that have been in regular use for a quarter century and still work reliably. Your saying that they only last 5 years is a gross underestimate.
Electronic ballasts are the real unreliable ones.
Careful some of those old ballasts contain PCBs.
i am a certified flourescent light expert now, after 6 videos and Still no explanTION OF HOW IT WORKS, but i can definTELUY appraise and identify them
too bad the rapid start magnetic ballast were phased out for the electronic ones
If they can make mini electronic ballasts for lightbulb style lights, do they also make them for long tube fluorescent lights? Thanks...
Magnetic ballast are still manufactured now,
Can you scrap the more modern ballasts like the Advance one? I was going to take one part to see if it had copper that was worth scrapping. If it had any tar in it, then I wouldn`t try it.
however, I do have to disagree on one small thing
you said... the rapid start ballasts are, in my opinion,
just as reliable as preheat. With both types of
ballasts, I very rarely have seen one fail... especially
in comparison with the new school electronic
ballasts... also, when an electronic ballast goes,
they usually go up in smoke as well... especially
with some compact fluorescent lamps.
do you know maby how much is the temperature operation of electronic ballast for t8 fluerescent lamp ?
The 99-cent store had a stack of a couple of dozen brand new basic 37W 4-ft fixtures (no reflector). I should bought a dozen or so just to get the ballasts for replacement, but I was in a hurry. They were gone the next day.
They started using 6"-long fl. lamps in can-type fixtures before CFLs came along. Now when they go out, they have to pay a lot for a bulb or ballast. A new CFL is 50 cents and it replaces both at the same time!
What happens if you put a 37W lamp in a 40W fixture?
Hello , you might not be around but uh how do you care for a ballast? I turn the lights off and when I leave I turn them off. What is the maintenance interval? ROTF..............
Where can I get those coloring CFLs ??
No doubt, the magnetic ballasts, whether they be preheat, rapid start or instant start, if operated in an environment so as to not overheat, will outlive the newer electronic junk many times over, 50 to 60 yrs or more is not uncommon. Biggest problem is when EOL lamps are left in the fixture for an extended period, or when failed (shorted) starters on a preheat fixture are not replaced promptly (a lamp that only lights up at the ends, puts the ballast in danger) Instant start lamps that spiral wildly with bright orange flashes are EOL and can overheat the ballast.
Another thing to watch out for, is using energy saving lamps like 34 watt T12 instead of 40 watt, or using T8 lamps on a magnetic ballast designed for T12. Many ballast burn ups occur because of this, considering the 40 watt T12 while still available, is getting harder to find, and it's tempting to go the easy route and use what's available, since they are both physically interchangeable, but not electrically interchangeable
I was also partial to magnetic , but after buying some really nice ballasts made by Robertson Lighting over the past couple years, I've shifted in favor of electronic. Tl
Robertson has a huge selection of all types/technologies; I narrowed in on their electronic rapid (not instant) start, power factor corrected units.
The light output with these is superior to my eyes (no 60Hz flicker nor the slight dimming effect caused by the flicker) . I think they will have a long service life - it all comes down to he design and choice of components i.e. quality capacitors , heat sinking , potting and so on... And these ballasts are not roasted the way CFL ballasts are (with their lack of heat sink, and cramped enclosure right next to the hot tube). . So we'll see how it goes ... 🤞🤞
@@yeliab814 another thing I love about the electronic rapid start ballasts is the availability of dimming ballasts for the 4 foot F32T8 the better quality ballasts capable of dimming down to 1 or 2%, by varying the arc current while keeping a constant voltage on the cathodes. Now, in this day and age we have dimmable 4 foot LED tubes, but it's so cool to see a dimmable fluorescent fixture. I don't know of any dimmable magnetic ballasts, but if they ever existed I would imagine they were noisy and inefficient when dimmed and thus rarely if ever used.
@@Sparky-ww5re wow i didn't know those were available. pretty darn cool, will have to look into. i had some dimmable CFLs 10+ yrs ago that worked surprisingly well but didn't realize retrofit dimming ballasts for standard tubes existed. 👍
This is true, oh the debating fun! I prefer the magnetic ballasts.. BUT I prefer OLD magnetic ballasts. The new ones are, in my opinion, are almost as likely to fail as a digital/IC ballast.
Here's why:
Capacitor failure. Old caps had PCB oils in them, and SELDOM failed. I see 40 year old HVAC condensers with original caps working fine but OFTEN have to replace new caps that now ban PCB fluids. I have all digital CFL bulbs, work great. t8's are noisy RF makers so I'll keep t12's for now
I don’t agree with your opinion that the old rapid start linear tube ballast might only last 5 years. I change a couple out here that there. Changed 5 out today that were probably from the 70’s and they were not cared for what so ever. There are still several dozen of them still choochin’ away in that facility day in and day out.
Electronic ballasts have better efficiency than 'choque' type ones in terms of losses. just take size/temperature as a comparison. Cheap ones last the lifetime of the bulb, if much. but brand ones run on trains/shops, etc can easily run 15-20 years. I do agree much less than 'choque' types, but still if one considers additional lamp life, rapid start, dimming options, better power factor and the possibility to operate on DC from a emergency supply or solar system, life savings may well be enough to cover to purchase a new fixture by the end of its useful life.
finally somebody that may be able to help me figure out if a ballast that is leaking oil has pcb's the capacitor says GE made in USA and the main No# is 72F1054 it is a 420 volt the numbers above these numbers is 65-10 600y. Housing of ballast has some rust on it because it was in the weather. Would you know?
If it is newer than 1979 or says non PCB it is safe
@@liamtheinventor1522 was about to say the same thing, although it's best to treat all magnetic ballasts/capacitors with the date/label missing as PCB and handle/dispose of accordingly, even in a slightly newer building from the early 1980s, because if the light fixtures were original to the building they may have sat in the warehouse for a few years before installation.
i like the magnetic ballast better than electronic ballast, so when the bulb is close to EOL, it will flicker, telling you time to get a new bulb, while electronic ballast don't flicker, it stays burning till it goes out, the only good thing about electronic ballast is that it don't heat up a lot when using LED on them, on tubes it does heat up... it don't last long like magnetic ballasts, i am an old school person myself, i rather have magnetic ballast than electronic
they say though that magnetic ballast have been banned supposedly ballast with factors 0.90 can sill be made well i don't see any i personally prefer rapid start over instant start
Ok, regarding current regulation; how do products such as "bright sticks" work? that is a simple FL tube with plastic mounting ends and no housing, they are completely disposable. I guess they may have a very very small electronic ballist, but it would have to be even smaller than a CFL's. Thanks!
The botton piece is a resistor
Can you show any circuit to use a one side open filament 36w fl , it does not work in its fixture.
***** accidently I found a way to use the one side broken filament fl, I was experimenting the fixture, I always solder the fl connection's for the best contact(I guess i blew one side filament when I was rotating the fl lamp in the fixture because it was working sometimes only). So I soldered the good filament side & was experimenting with a EM ballast , the other broken side I connected a 50w incandescent lamp with the starter , the lamp was cycling on & off continusly, so I replaced the whole setup with a electronic ballast , the lamp worked from the moment I switched it on, the 50w incandescent lamp would lite up using the EM ballast but not in the case off electronic ballast,so I removed the lamp & shorted the two wires & connected to one of the terminals of the broken side filament this setup worked & have been using it for past 6 months.
atleast my exp was sucessfull w/o any short circuits/blasts & i didn't had to throw the one side open filament FL.
If it's a two lamp rapid start ballast, its most
likely series circuited... so if one lamp flickers,
so will the other one. lol
nothingbutlighting only the best lol
Are the ballasts filled with copper? Scrap worth a few pennies or just garbage?
Simpler ballasts on 230V (no step up transformer needed)?
Nivicoman well then some smaller fixtures need a step down transformer
Bingo my dad the mechanic since the 60s
Keep one for 40 years just now getting faulty
Him not being there now it only started failing
"Capacitor complicated so I won't go into it in this video" LOL. 3 words: LC Circuit (inductive/capacitive resonate circuit). Worth noting: PCB's were pervasive in old ballasts.
6:25 thats not a transformer, its a choke
5 years sounds like the electronic ballast figure not the rapid start figure... anyway some lamps defy the norm, many Merc lamps have lasted decades on nightly use despite what they say about the 25K hr life.
i know they phased out the magnetic ballast they said they were gonna keep manufacturing ones with power factors of 0.90 well i don't see any did i miss something concedering they exempted t12s with a cri of 87+
💡👍40,18,15⚡
the light in my school just stop working. in my writing and social studies class has 2 lights not working.
as they say, they don't make em' like they used to.
the old pre-heat systems are much easier on the lamps and last much much longer
6:00 Re: CFL, we have a circuit that lights the same CFL for .36W, yes, that is 36 HUNDREDTHS of a WATT!!!
Now, the drawbacks being:
1. Size of circuit (fewer component count but it uses an older CAR IGNITION coil)
2. Life of Bulb (lifespan unknown, needs R&D)
and for the grand finale,
#3. INVENTED by Nikola TESLA
So Edison would never use it LOL
Unless he could steal it
Drink every time he says ballast
i dont know how i feel about the rapid start ballast your lucky if it lasts 5 years where i work we are just now replacing them ( they would not start the tubes any more) and they are original to the fixture and they were put in in the early 80s 81 or 82 i think is when my boss said the lights were changed id say they dont owe anything and probably paid for a new one or two durring their life
it instant start. i bet the ballasts are cheap. they have already fixed them and i see every one working for now.
AH, gotta love the greedy bastard companies and gov. that blow a vein any time someone starts talking about up production on some of Tesla's good stuff that could make the world a better place and keep my money in my pocket, heh.
Watch out for toxic PCB's. BTW there is no reason why any fluorescent tube can not be made to last 1000 years...like everything else, they are made defective, by design!
Bob I have some pre world war 2 fixtures and lamps that are still running.
All about how a ballast is made / built.......but nothing on how they " work ". Please !!!! Going to explain how they work...then say they are too complicated ?
ohhh... yeah I see that all the time. That's a bad
electronic ballast. A.K.A, piece of crap... most
likely anyways unless they're the old school
magnetic slimline.