The Lamp Room

As we might know Philips will be closing the SOX plant in 2020 (probably parts of it before)

As we know i am on a project of saving and restoring the production equipment of a ballast factory



Is there anything that would stop us (atleast who are from the UK) from joining hands and doing just the same with the Philips SOX equipment ?

- This is much more interesting than hauling the lamps off eBay

- This is better than watching things go in despair

- The cost may be dramatically less than expected. If there is nothing to do with the equipment, it may go for as low as scrap value. It's only the universal machines (e.g. presses) that cost, but in lamp making there are much less universal machines than in metal stamping



I have some propositions for new form factors for SOX lamps, which will be more useful in modern applications (i.e. not for relamping old SOX luminaires) :

- CFL-like self ballasted SOX. Among other things, in the small wattages (~18..35W) useful for HID lanterns in which the ballast was removed for LED corn use before, and then found out that the LED corn is useless

- Fluorescent size SLI tube in new range of wattages (~20W, ~40W, ~65W) for direct retrofit of Fluorescents for getting more light off the same luminaire (shorter arctube, only the center 1/3 of the lamp lit)

- Fluorescent size SLI tube in wider selection of wattages with integrated electronic ballast inside the outer tube, for use as retrofit for FL luminaires that were converted for LED tubes before

- With PL-T base for direct retrofit of PL-T lamps (on the same ballast)



I'm interested to hear you. It would be great if we can get something like this done

Lack of demand for SOX and anything other than LED really makes anything like this completely unviable... otherwise the manufacturers would stilll be making them.

Sadly, I have to agree with FSB. Whilst the idea sounds great to me and probably most people here, I can't see there being any real demand on the mass market.

Good luck with it though if you do buy any if it.

It is not supposed to be mass produced to replace LED everywhere. It is a low demand solution for select applications

Lighting manufacturers may have their own considerations why not keep the line :

- It is not viable to keep manufacturing traditional SOX lamps (intended for SOX-specific luminaires) as the luminaires are disappearing

- There is no effort put into development of any new non-LED lighting. There is no intention to redesign the SOX lamp to a new form factor

- There is no interest in making anything that might be an alternative to LED, since LED is the highest profit lamp of all lamps. To the contrary, non LED lamps are subjected to deliberate quality downgrades and lamp bans in order to promote the LEDs

- The cost of building to keep the equipment in and personnel to operate it does not reduce with the lower demands. It only can change with relocation of the equipment, but a company like Philips can't operate out of a shed and won't invest in training people for work on the line at a new location

- The line may be suitable for making some additional lamp, for example LED filament lamp (not much effort to do those, just sealing them into a bulb...), which production in itself is viable. Companies like Philips allready have much more efficient general purpose lamp sealing equipment in other plants so they dont need this equipment

Some of those considerations might or might not exactly apply to us : We are not members of CELMA, we don't have the same maintenance costs as big companies, and so on



Also, lets assume we are not going to be viable. Is there a low limit to the costs at which this matters ? (i.e. a cost we would accept as spending on a wish) ?

In recent communication between me and Airam Finland (they were closing a GLS lamp plant and i inquired, James Hooker deserves a great praise for linking me to the right people), the cost stated was on the order of 5000 Euros for the entire set of equipment

If the offering from Philips would cost as much, divided by number of us who join hands for the project, would it still be not viable putting that money into a garage "Neon shop" ?



As for me buying things :

I am not a mega corporation. I am just 28 year old Ash and i worked (and work) hard to earn the money i spent on the ballast project

I dont know if i will cover the costs with things produced on the equipment (right now, i'm still not done transferring all the equipment, let alone setting it up)

I took this project as a personal empowering project for developing greater engineering knowledge and skills, which will affect my value as engineer. And as making a wish of my own come true. So far it allready gained me a good job (at an electrical engineering company not related to the ballast business or to VS, but thanks to knowledge i already gained from the project)

I took what was available in my country. This will be enough of a weekend project for the foreseeable future. It's now your turn. I will help in everything i can : From consultation and experience, to engineering solutions for specific things we'll need, to (hopefully) providing the ballasts. Maybe in the $ too, but only a little, and it's not yet a promise

The bit I disagree with is that LED being high profit it’s not at all a lot of manufacturers are loosing a lot of money thanks to LED the price of LED panels in the UK is now at £20 for a 600X600 mod.
LED is absolutely killing the lamp and lighting industry

I would think that producing new form sox lamps for replacement of other type of lamp is not viable idea. Existing fluorescent and hid lamp installations are being replaced by led really fast and by the time we might get the first somewhat reliable new type lamp out is there any more fixtures left where to use it. Producing our own fixture is even more unrealistic idea.

I'm pretty sure that storaging at least sodium in quantities we would need for even small scale production needs some sort of approval from authorities due to nature of sodium if they even give one for private persons. It's availability might also cause problem since it's something which normal private person has no any use. We would most likely have to set up a company of our own if not immediately at least in very early stage. While ofcourse not impossible if will further increase complexity of this project.

The thing that sox is still the most efficient light source might be true but from aspect of energy usage led has advantage of better optic control (light where it's needed) and better light output control (right amount of light for different situations). These two seems to be the way lighting is going.

For a quite extensive range of luminaire designs, It requires nothing but cutting the box from sheet metal and PMMA with laser (costs of laser shops are per working hour or per piece and very reasonable), folding it up, spraying, and sticking in ordinary off-the-shelf "lighting lego" such as terminals and sockets

It is by far the least complicated part compared to lamps and gear

If you are looking strictly into ready made luminaire shells :

- The production of luminaires with plain unballasted E27 socket (some of them basically the same ex-GLS/CFL, ex-PL or ex-HID stuff) is going fairly well, since when combined with cheap LED lamps, they provide one of the cheapest and easiest to maintain LED lighting solutions. Anything self-ballasted with E27 base can be used with them as is and this includes the "SOX CFL"

- Some integrated LED products, especially the outdoor ones, use shells which are still the same as in older non LED versions of the same luminaires, or even when were designed around LED are still spacious enough inside to contain other lamps and gear. Many manufacturers of shells will be as glad to supply empty shells to order as they would complete luminaires

- I dont know how things are on your end, but here both the LED tube retrofits into existing Fluorescent strips, and brand new Fluorescent strips that come from the manufacturer without any gear and pre-wired for LED tube use, are extremely common and only keep spreading. They will stay around for very long



I made a search about the Sodium when you raised this point on LG, and have not found anything about such requirements or about minimum quantities from which requirements apply. (There are listed requirements for some Sodium compounds, which have nothing to do with elemental Sodium)

I could inquire some more. If you know otherwise please point me to it



I dont see SOX as being better than SON for general road lighting exactly for the optics reason. So i'm not aiming there (except if there would be some demand for lamps in the old SOX form factor, which is of course welcome)

However, there are applications where a wide beam is used and there the larger light source of SOX is not a problem. Yet the ability to form SOX into a tube (SLI), or to get it to work correctly with very cheap electronic ballasts (not possible with HID) gives it an advantage

Of producing own luminaire I think the biggest thing is that we as manufacturer have to make sure it fulfills all the standarts and requirements set for such things as we are responsible that it's safe to use. This may require us to use some external inspection which can be expensive. Same thing goes for lamps if we are going to sell them.


I think sodium restriction might fall under firecode as being fire hazard.

The way to design and make a safe luminaire is straightforward common sense / knowledge of electricity/electrical standards

The exact requirements (besides the common sense) are well defined

For what i know :

- In the EU the CE mark is the minimum requirement, which is done by self certification. I.e. I manufacture the luminaire and verify that it complies to all EU standards, and then i can put the CE mark on it

- In the UK there was the BSI who had to test things. I don't know whether this changed in any way when UK joined the EU and when UK left the EU

- In Israel in the old days every such product was required to pass through the Standards Institute of Israel. There is a mess with it, as some standards are missing or not implemented and some are getting obsolete. There is also inconsistency in how the standards are enforced (most of the time they are not)

Some additional thoughts :

- There are artists making "one off" designs of luminaires. Most of the time with nothing more than 230V/E27 in them (traditionally for Incandescent lamps). They are sure legit, and i very doubt that every single thing they make requires approval because they are one-off custom things

- Custom order stuff may be exempt because it is custom and it's specification is agreed between the manufacturer and user. It may be possible to classify pretty much anything made-to-order as custom order ?

Sadly ash we have not left the EU yet this day could not come soon enough for me