That looks to have had a stuck starter for a while

I can smell it from here lol.

It's about a 25% chance of it coming on. It's a scary thought that someone's left this thing on thinking it was off and it's just burning away. What if the flat went up if they went to the shops?

It’s a bit shocking how someone would leave this on a stuck starter for so long?, have you re-lamped it?

I will be.

It turns out it uses a Thorn Vivatronic starter that's fucked.

Interesting - Can you take the starter out and let us figure out what failed in it ?

I might have some spare vivatronics somewhere if you want.

Also interested to see what's up with the Viva. There's not a huge amount in them, I suspect it'll be repairable? Or just put a normal starter holder in

Probably the triac has gone short.

This would ultimately be the case, but clues how ? It is not just any random SCR, they are rated to 1500V and the design of the starter unit is supposed to limit the pulse below that. Unless something else failed first

Even if the thyristor device is rated at 1500V it can still fail if there is a weak spot that is vulnerable to voltage spikes. The device will be glass passivated, which is known to suffer from such weaknesses. Failure rates would be low but random and unpredictable.

The noise on the mains in my block is awful. You can see if you watch the LED lights in the corridor the supplies getting a belting off of it. I've seen a lot of these thorn fittings in the block and it is very unusual that one would fail. I will get back to you all with the starter very soon.

Cool would be nice to see what's wrong with it and repaired if possible. I've recently acquired a few old Thorn fittings with Viva's in and a couple or three are iffy. They start fine once bit rhe

Cool would be nice to see what's wrong with it and repaired if possible. I've recently acquired a few old Thorn fittings with Viva's in and a couple or three are iffy. They start fine once after being left for some time, but then fail to work after being power cycled

The starter is connected in series with an 1.5 Henry inductor + parallel to a gas discharge (voltage clamping device...). That gives it quite some shielding against spikes from the line