The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning

Ed Nisley's Blog: Shop notes, electronics, firmware, machinery, 3D printing, laser cuttery, and curiosities. Contents: 100% human thinking, 0% AI slop.

The New Hotness

  • Fluorescent Shop Light Ballast Caps

    It never ceases to amaze me that these capacitors appear in the AC power line circuits inside old-school fluorescent shop lights:

    Shop light ballast cap
    Shop light ballast cap

    It really is a capacitor:

    Shop light ballast cap A - test
    Shop light ballast cap A – test

    Its sibling from the other end of the fixture had more ESR:

    Shop light ballast cap B - test
    Shop light ballast cap B – test

    Both were likely within spec, whatever that means.

    I have no idea what’s lurking inside the tidy LED tubes now living in that same fixture, of course.