It may take a few days, as the lantern is right at the back of the big garage cupboard at the moment. If I stay at home tomorrow I'll probably be able to fish it out, but otherwise it'll be the weekend.

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Yep, I spotted that and added another to the order. By my reckoning there's just two left for sale now. Will they be hurriedly snapped up, or will the last two make it unsold into another decade?

My contact's now claiming he has a spare GR150 bowl, so a trip to Stelmer's with this spare bowl for him, and his and your SLI lamps, and via A.C. Ford's to pick up a few more brackets is definitely on the cards for sometime soon!


Yes I'd much prefer that. Funnily enough there was once a SON retrofit for 80w mercury - rated at 69w and made by Sylvania, but I can't find any on sale now.

Last time I was at A C Ford's, Brian had some new Thorn 90w SOX/140w SLI ballasts, as unused stock. Ask him while you're there.

That was quick!!!

Come up in the New Year, after Christmas as I can give you cash then.

      



No problem.

I'm sure my transformer is original to the lantern so any GEC 90w SOX from the late 70's/early 80's will have a similar looking ballast (with identical wiring) inside them.

As for converting lanterns to CFL, there is a variant of CFL that uses the same type of 3 pin BC lampholder that mercury uses - so all you'd need to do is change the lamp and the ballast. the ballast will be an electronic type so you'd just have the live In / live Out connections like you do on a mercury ballast.


Anyway, this is my ballast from the Z9454


It's a Z1622P leak tranny.
220v goes over terminals 3 & 4
240v goes over terminals 3 & 5
Lamp over 1 and 6
Capacitor over 2 and 5

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So Stelmer's ballast looks like it is wired up the same way. Ignoring the numbers on his and just mapping connections to terminal positions it comes out the same as mazeteam's.

It looks like the PFC is connected across part of the "bottom end" of the multi-tap voltage winding created by terminals 3, 4 and 5, with the "neutral end" of this winding being 2. By using the capacitor as resonant with the ballast, the size of the ballast can be reduced. It can't however be a major contributor as the capacitor isn't marked as essential (as on 180w SOX gear), it is still only a 250v ac rating (180w SOX gear PFCs are 380v rated) and the fact that the lamp will work without the PFC.

Hmmm.....this is truly interesting. Thanks Chris. Quite pleased I also got the numbers wired correctly, that's a first

I'll wire it up as it was and measure the PF again. Should be interesting.


Also, is it suitable for powering a SLI lamp?

Well, at least you were able to see how I wired it, especially considering I used white wires to the lampholder, which clashed with the white wires of the PFC capacitor!

I believe it can power an SLI lamp, as it's a Leak Transformer and not ignitor-based gear. Obviously only one way to find out though...

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I went there last night and there was no GR150 bowl I'm afraid. He did have one which he was storing in his garage, but there's no power to his garage and his son managed to tread on it in the dark while getting his motorbike out.

If I come up in the new year, that gives him at least another four weeks to get another.

My sincere apologies for that, but I'm sure he will sort it in the end, and when he does get another I will bring it to mine immediately to avoid any further mishaps.

No problem David.

I look forward to the bowl, lamp and an Alpha 6      (Even though i've nowhere to put an Alpha 6 yet....)