Perhaps, but when I've done it, it is because of a desire to repair one unit, rather than to replace a great many or suffer from an line of matching units with an odd one out.

I have also done a similar thing where it was not a fitting as such but components built into a rather nice cupboard, with no desire to do damage to it.

First things first. It is a waste of time and money to replace everything until it works.


Have you checked continuity of the old ballast with your multimeter? If that is OK have you used the correct starters? If it is two tubes in series you need series starters not standard ones.

We don't use dollars in this country. Nor do we use cents, but hopefully we have sense.


The bottom line is the ballast is unlikely to be faulty. Most probably poor connections at the tube ends or wrong starters fitted as they have been changed.


10 minute job with a multimeter.

Wow, I go away for 5 mins and there's a flurry (!) of responses.


The client wants to keep the light (its part of a bathroom cupboard) and who am I to say he can't and keep it out of landfill. He's paying after all.

I learnt my lesson long ago when I took down a hideous light fitting for a client and asked if I should put it out by the bins.... no she said, that's the one you're putting in the living room. Oops, that was me told and I now keep my opinions to myself


The tubes and starters were all correct, so I'm pretty sure it's the ballast... they are cheap,  so I reckon it's worth going with one just in case.


Thanks again for all your help - it's nice to pop my head back after all this time and find that people are as helpful as ever


have a fun weekend

BB

Yes, but you can at least check the ballast for continuity first. Takes less than 10 seconds.

I was assuming that I could just cut and join together the wires that go 'into' the starter sockets so bypassing them

Just to be clear - in the old arrangement the starter is usually in series with the two tube end filaments - in the new one all four tube connections need to go back to the new HF  "ballast"(*) - so it's not just a case of shorting out the connections to the starters and replacing the old wound ballast with the new one. Chances are you'll need some extra wire.


(*) for a twin tube arrangement usually two tube ends share one circuit, so you have 6 wires back to the ballast rather than 8.


  - Andy.

Hello everyone and a very belated update on this topic.


The answer was....be patient! 


I rewired a very old and dodgy junction box in the loft above this light and lo and behold when I emerged covered in 100+ year old dust and switched back on, the light was on!! I was getting 240V before, but I think both the client and I didn't wait long enough in between switching the bloody thing on and switching it off, thinking 'its not working'


Everyone happy. 


Thanks for your answers though, they were really helpful for future reference

BB

Ah yes, very old fittings can take a heck of a long time to fire up!  Thanks for the update

We used to have to turn on the TV set 5 to 10 minutes before watching Coronation street!