Odd Behavior in Flourescent Light Fixtures

He was ironic, you twat!

". . . imported from china with its total lack of quality!"

Your myopic view of Chinese manufactured goods is grounded in a malevolent prejudice unsupported by the facts.

Are you an unemployed American union factory worker?

L.J.

No, my view of chinese quality stems from experience. I am not swayed by your Dim-O-Crap view on "political correctness". I am only swayed by right and wrong. and chinese quality is non-existent. Maybe 15 or 20 years from now they will improve as the Japanese have but, right now it is trash. On the other hand my daughter has a Korean car that so far seems first rate. By the way, when the chinese get their quality standards up to match that of civilized nations, I will capitalize chinese.

For centuries, people believed that the earth was flat, in spite of enormous amounts of evidence to the contrary. This historical fact best demonstrates that a person's experience of "reality" is limited by the choices they have made and their internal dialogue, or lack of one.

Everything you experience in life starts first with a sentence. Since you have already concluded that all Chinese products are junk, you can't see anything outside of that myopic paradigm that might contradict it.

Horses aren't the only species that wears blinders to keep from being spooked by surprises.

I don't know if you have any particular interests in China, but I and many others are already at the point of no return for most Chinese products.....you won't change our minds, at least not for the next 10 years or so.....

Each to his own.....

There was another blog on CR4 about Chinese quality and Chinese customer (lack of) support. We do not need to go through it all again here I feel......

Best wishes for a great weekend...

If you need a link to the other blog, I will see if I can still find it for you.....

Sounds like a ballast problem to me.

Put good grounds on the fixtures.

Won't fix the problem, but is a must (safety first).

Thanks, cwarner7_11. That is exactly the kind of answer I look for here at CR4, and has been rated a GA accordingly.

Indeed! no political nonsense!

Boooo !!! to you and the other 3.

GAers, show quantitave studies for that miraculous phenomenon.

Some good and to my mind correct answers, but I would replace the complete unit(s) and ground them.....maybe with shorter units and a switch to select how many should be on at each window.....save electricity!

If your fluorescent lights are not earthed they should be,I suggest you check your house wiring there could be some dangerous problems .

Also the lamps to use on your system should have a metallic strip along the length of the tube this aids the starting against a ground plane.

Thanks, Garth. The house is, if anything, over-wired for the time, and the outlets next to the fixtures are 3 wire grounded type. It's just the lamp cord from the fixture to the outlet that is the problem. The fixtures themselves are metal, so soundsl like if I ground them that should help. (I bought a couple of new 3-wire leads for this- just need to find them and get them installed.

If the bulbs are of a type designed to support plant growth ("GroLux", et al) , then you may be stuck with fluorescent light fixtures. That being the case I think that cwarner7_11's answer and Andy Germany's are spot on.

If, however, the lighting is more for decorative, aesthetic purposes than for pants, I would encourage you to give serious thought to replacing them with bulbs using LED's. You may not have to replace the fixtures. I'm not sure; depends on the type.

The light output of recently developed LED's and their efficiency is nothing short of phenomenal. Modern replacements for fluorescent and Edison base type bulbs are common and while their initial purchase price may be higher, they will outlive you and I combined and save a bundle in energy costs.

You may even get a government credit for doing so.

L.J.

My kitchen light does the same thing. When it won't start, i flip it off when i see a little glow and flip it back on quickly. that always works. By the way, which wire is ground on knob and tube wiring anyway ?

Actually, to me it sounds like a bad connection on one or both contacts that the bulb plugs in to. It would require dismantling the fixture enough to inspect the wiring and surface condition of these contacts. But that's where I'd be headed if it was mine. I just experienced this in a fixture in the apartment I'm in. I know these contacts are normally brass or brass colored alumninum or similar and may not oxidize as readily as other metals, but still, that's what I'd look at first.

As I mentioned, I plan to upgrade the existing fixtures with electronic ballasts and T8 bulbs to save energy. I just can't justify the expense or use of resources to replace the existing fixtures until they fail.

As to quality, the original 1960 motor in the bathroom vent fan recently failed (bearing falilure- electrical components are fine.) When I pulled it out, I discovered that it has oil-lubed bearings, and was supposed to have been being lubricated every year or so. If this had been done, it would probably have another 40 years of life left in it. I may just try to re-polish the motor shaft and have new undersize bronze bearings manufactured, and re-install the motor.

Hi Mark

I had same problem with my bathroom vent fan when I moved into my place [old house], luckily it had ball races so just put new ones in. I would have thought a 1960 house would have a fan with ball races as all the models nowadays seem to have "cheaper" sleeve bearings. Is it possible you can fit needle bearings in place of bronze sometimes the dimensions will allow this?