Okay, this has been plaguing me for a while but I'm finally worried eough about it to post here.

When I first got my LL lamp/ballast combo, it would light on the first strike, every time. The projector has only gotten real use for the last 2 weeks or so it has been operational. When the projector is cold (being turned on for the first time for the day), it refuses to light. I hear the clicking of the eballast, but the lamp refuses to light. It doesn't even flicker or show any signs of life. If I turn off the projector, let it sit for a few minutes, the try again, it lights immediately. Thereafter, it lights on the first try for the rest of the day ...

I have a feeling this might be due to some sort of thermal cycling? I am concerned that my eballast might be crapping out, though. I hate to strike the lamp without it lighting because I have heard this is bad for the lamp.

Can someone who is more learned than I in these matters help? Is this a sign of a failing eballast?

Im afraid there is no definitive answer for you at this point ..... right now I just consider it to be another intermittent E-ballast issue to chalk up next to all the others.

Right now I have a faulty E-ballast opened up in front of me that Im trying to diagnose, but this is becoming extremely difficult because I cant find a schematic for this E-ballast or let alone a comprable E-ballast.

Ive learned their basic operational points, and its a simple device in that means, but I know of nothing that would be a specific cause or root to your problem.

Since you have it open ... do all the components have proper heat dissipation precautions (heatsinks). I believe that many may be succumbing to heat. Also, are any of the power elements directly in contact with that finned surface? It gets prety darn hot after a couple of hours.

take pics of it open and post maybe someone can recognise some componants.

Joe

Yeah, there are about 5 large components in the form of common BJTs/MOSFETS package that are attached to the heat sink with heatsink grease, but unfortuanatly there are no numbers on them, so I cant identify them with the eye.

Joe, pictures were already posted by VROOM, it was his dead ballast that he sent me, most parts are identifiable, but some arent, It would be really helpfull if I could get a schematic for one of these.

sadly I am having a similar issue, well.. i've had it for a few months now.. where it seems as if the ballast needs to be warmed up or something to get the bulb to light.. however, as of yesterday I think it has officially died or something.. i get little to no response now, even if i blow dry the ballast warm (which used to work). I've checked all my connections and everything.. no luck.. just a small flicker out of the bulb every now and then, and the periodic click out of the eballast.. guess I have to buy a new one? :-(

I had problems with my eballast not firing every time so I soldered all conections and I have not had any trouble since, I would recomend soldering the conections and try it.
Peter

Time for an update.

Today, I rigged a piezo alarm that rings when my high temperature switch shuts off the bulb. Previously, the bulb would just go off and I would assume the temperature switch was tripping.

Well, today the bulb went off after 3 hours and guess what - no alarm!! It was actually the ballast that shut off due to overheating! I touched it and it was HOT.

Before I go any further, let me say that I have soldered my connections so I don't think this is an issue of too much load resistance on the ballast. I am seriously doubting whether these units were designed for passive cooling. The "heatsink" seems to need airflow in order to work. When I put a 20" fan directed at the ballast at a distance of about 3 feet, the ballast remains cool.

Perhaps this is the reason so many eballasts have been failing? I'm going to jerry rig some 80mm fans to mount on the ballast. Hopefully, these will provide sufficient airflow to cool it. It still seems like perhaps I have an oddball (defective?) unit because it shouldn't be heating so severely.

I'll ask again - does anyone have an eballast that has been working for some time and feels hot to the touch? If mine is truly defective, I would like to replace it.

I'll check tonight, however, my ballast has some active cooling. It's in the chamber that my HTPC is in, which has one 80mm fan drawing air through it. (It's not MUCH active cooling, but it keeps my processor and hard drive temps acceptable.

I just started having this problem last night, only I can't get the lamp to fire at all. Is there any trick to diagnosing whether the eballast is dead?

I'm gonna try and find a 400W metal halide bulb at home depot to try and rule out the bulb. I'll post the model before I test if it's a non-Ushio/Venture.

It is a phillips IIRC .....

It will be 400W metal halide that is designated for M59 ballast .... it will also be a large bulb (ED37)

Make sure your connections are soldered. Before, when I used wire nuts from the ballast to the mogul, it would take multiple strikes to light the bulb. Now it strikes on the first or second attempt.

As promised, I checked my eBallast. After part 1 of Fellowship of the Ring, extended edition, the eballast is hot to the touch. I did not leave my fingers on it for long enough to burn, but it was definitely more than warm. (I will change the location of my temp probe tonight, so that I can get actual readings of the heatsink temperature.) Curently, I have 2 probes on the LCD (top & bottom) and one on the HTPC hard drive. I will relocate the temp probe at the top of the LCD to the eballast heat sink. This should allow me to get objective measurements of the heat sink temperature, which will be better than "hot to the touch."

Thing is, with wire nut connections, it fired immediately on the first try, every time. Now it just won't. I'm not sure the wiring contact is the problem (especially since it stopped working while it was running), but I'll try to rewire it anyway.

Do coil & core ballasts put off this much heat? If I can't do an exchange through the Lumenlab store, I'll need to go with the Venture. I can't afford $100 a pop on a ballast that dies after three months.

The coil and cores do put off heat, and get warm ... but Not that warm ... most people have them stuffed in the lamp chamber of the Projector no problem ....

If you look at my second plog, I have mine stuffed in this little outboard power supply box I built. With no fan to cool either ... after many many hours of operation it gets luke warm on the outside of the 1/2MDF box I made.

Id say if you touched the actuall transformer itself that id be pretty hot .... nonetheless they are 100x's more reliable than the E-ballast.

NOW you tell us . Seriously, I went with it because I thought it was the bees knees in terms of effieciency, brightness, and prolonging bulb life. This is turning out NOT to be the case. To add insult to injury, the coil ballasts are even cheaper!! DOH!!!! :angry:

Well, at present. my eballast is a toasty warm 107 deg F. It's been on for about an hour.

The eballast can prolong the life of the bulb, when working properly. For me one of the main attractions was the promise of a fast restrike time. Turns out that's nowhere near as important as I thought it might be. Oh well.

107 is cool in comparison to mine. It is at least 130; I can't keep my hand on it for longer that 1/2 second or so without pain. As soon as my light fixture is fixed, I'll be back to tweaking it with active cooling. Looking back, I wish I had just gone for the coil & core.

Well, over the course of the night, mine was pretty stable around 115F, (It stayed at about 107 for another 20 minutes or so first) but it had occasional spikes (For reasons unknown) to about 135 (There's a temp alarm at 130, and it would go off once in a while. Really distracting -- I've reset the alarm for 140, and it didn't go off again.

I am using Coralvue eballast and have had no problem so far. I watch movies for four hours and it just feels warm a bit, even kid can touch it.

Well, not my coil. It's emitting a little warmth but nothing to be concerned about. It's also in a separate box w/it's own cooling fan.