Gas discharge bulb

philo · 2018-02-05T17:54:33+00:00

Because he heard I was good at fixing things, a guy with a silk-screening business asked me to look at one of his lights. It's a backup unit so not crucial, but he said no one in town can fix it and it would cost a fortune to send it back to the factory. He was told that it's old and obsolete and even the factory would probably not be able to repair it anyway. I told him I'd look at it, but there was a good chance it would be ready for the scrap heap when I got done. It had "complex" circuitry and as far as I could tell, it first applied a "lower" voltage to the bulb (perhaps 230 volts). Then after it warmed up, would boost the voltage to 600 or so. I know nothing about gas discharge lights, I was wondering if anyone here has an info. As far as I could tell, they emit a lot of UV. He told me that when he first started his business, he had a home made 500watt halogen light that worked fine...it just took 15 minutes to do a burn and he wanted to do things a bit faster. After I gave up trying to repair it, I removed the bulb and sockets and retrofitted halogen fittings and a 230v 1500 watt bulb. He has not tested it yet, but the thing is too bright to even look at so it should work. But still I'm curious about the gas discharge lamp. It's tubular and has no filament.

Gas discharge bulb

Feb 05, 2018 22 Replies

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philo 8 years ago

The guy finally tested it and it did not do the job.

The good news is he was able to get a good, used unit locally.

So his shop has two working units.

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Jon Elson 8 years ago

Yes, I used a big halogen lamp MANY years ago, and had VERY long exposure times. A 400 W mercury vapor lamp with the outer glass shield removed did a little better. Then, I finally switched to a different photoresist that was more sensitive, and now use filtered black light tubes and have about 1 minute exposures. (This is for PC board resist, not silk screens, so their emulsions might still need a lot more light.)

Jon

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philo 8 years ago

Well, at least he now as a 1500 watt floodlight if he needs one.

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