Problems With Electronic Starters!

[John]

I'm sure many are well aware of the benefits of using Electronic starters.
(ie: less end blackening, faster start up, & long starter life)

Now for the bad news:

We have seen many problems with the continued replacement of S12 starters with the newer electronic starters.

Initial lamp Start up: When using electronic starters we have had more calls about lamps not lighting & claiming to have defective lamps. The problem here is that the electronic starter only fires once! With a standard S12 starter they will continue to strike untill the lamp is on. With the electronic starter they strike once & if it doesn't light, it isn't going too. The cure for this is to cycle the bed on & off about 5-10 times, this usally cures the problem 95% of the time. This will need to be done every time you relamp a bed. Also moving the starter to a socket that already lit a lamp & switching it to the socket that is not lit also cures the problem.

Increase in amp draw: Have seen this problem in a few units. The issue here is that when you use an S12 starter, typically about 60-70% of the lamps come on right away & then the remainder flicker on after that. With the electronic starters all the lamps try to come on at once, which may cause a spike on initial lamp draw & can cause a fuse to blow or a breaker to pop!

Lamp ballast mismatch: Many beds come with 140 ballast trying to power a 160W lamp. In this application you will have many troubles with standard electronic starters. What you need here is a special electronic starter that has an extended preheat built in. You will not notice a difference in starters yet you will have much more success using the Extended preheat starters in these applications.

Here are some of the popular electronic starters available on the market.
Smart Start- sold exclusively by URI all have Extended preheat.
Cosmostart/E - sold by many Cosmedico distributors nation wide
Cosmostart/EPH- little know version of the Extended preheat.
Oko Start- Sold by Aegis inc, The original electronic starter
Sunfit E-Power- sold by Ultrasun
MagicFlash- Heraeus Germany- haven't seen in the US
Philips Cleo Power- I haven't seen any yet, but they are available.