Emulator won't strike

I'm having a strange problem with one of my Emus. I've tried it with both a brand new HOLL-1000 lamp, and a slightly used one that works perfect in another fixture. You can see the lamp try to strike multiple times, the igniter doesn't seem to have a problem creating an arc in the lamp, but the lamp never actually holds the arc for more than a split second. It's almost like the power supply can't supply enough current to keep the arc stable.

Has anyone experienced this issue before? What did you do to resolve it? I haven't used this fixture in some time because I couldn't afford to replace the lamp for a while, but just recently got replacement lamps in, and now I'm having this problem.

Any ideas?

Jeff:dunno:
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    Ok, got to dig in a bit more on this now that i'm back from vacation. Looking accross P1 (the connector between the PSB and the igniter/lamp) I see about 50 or so volts DC at power up, and it tapers off to around 20 or so volts as expected. If I switch my meter to AC, though, I see about 50VAC superimposed on that DC voltage. (I havent' put a scope on it yet to see what it actually looks like). This seems wrong to me, since Xenon lamps are supposed to be DC lamps. I'm not sure if the AC is leaking backwards from the igniter, or if there's a bad rectifier on the PSB. It appears that most of the PSB is built using SCRs which i've never really been brought up to speed on, so I'm not sure how to determine where in the circuit to look for a failed device, or even how to recognize a failed device.

    I think my next step might be to try the PSB after disconnecting it from the lamp/igniter, and see if there's still AC at P1. I'd rather not replace the whole PSB or Igniter if I can repair whichever is broken...

    Anyone have any further input?


    Jeff
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  • 0
    Ok, got to dig in a bit more on this now that i'm back from vacation. Looking accross P1 (the connector between the PSB and the igniter/lamp) I see about 50 or so volts DC at power up, and it tapers off to around 20 or so volts as expected. If I switch my meter to AC, though, I see about 50VAC superimposed on that DC voltage. (I havent' put a scope on it yet to see what it actually looks like). This seems wrong to me, since Xenon lamps are supposed to be DC lamps. I'm not sure if the AC is leaking backwards from the igniter, or if there's a bad rectifier on the PSB. It appears that most of the PSB is built using SCRs which i've never really been brought up to speed on, so I'm not sure how to determine where in the circuit to look for a failed device, or even how to recognize a failed device.

    I think my next step might be to try the PSB after disconnecting it from the lamp/igniter, and see if there's still AC at P1. I'd rather not replace the whole PSB or Igniter if I can repair whichever is broken...

    Anyone have any further input?


    Jeff
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