I recently replaced my 4-foot garage lights with some cheap new fixtures.
Flipping the lights on generates +30 db noise on 160 meters.
I got tired of having to beat the XYL every time she took a load of laundry out
to the garage at night, so today I decided to solve the problem.
Hooking up my handy FRS walkie talkies so I could hear the noise while out in
the garage, I unplugged each fixture and found there was one in the lot that
made almost no noise at all. I bought all the fixtures at the same place and
same time so I took them apart to see if they had different ballasts or
bypass/suppressors. No such luck, they were exactly the same.
Then I noticed the metal ends on the fluorescent bulbs in the noiseless fixture
were bright aluminum and the noisy ones were metallic green. Some fixtures had
one of each and also made noise.
The aluminum ones are "Phillips 40CW" and the green ones are "Phillips 40T12".
I replaced all the bulbs with the 40CW type and the noise dropped to S-8.
Adding a 0.1 ufd bypass to the last fixture on the line reduced the noise to
below my ambient level.
If you have a minor fluorescent light noise problem, changing the bulb type may
help.
Strange thing is the old 8-foot fixture I didn't replace has no noticeable
noise, and I thought they were worse offenders.
Rick Darwicki -= N6PE =-
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