SOX Diagnostics
What does it look like when SOX lights fail?
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What happens when SOX lights go wrong?
Let's go through some of the common problems that happens with SOX lights.
I'm going to keep it basic: so all of my explanations will try and avoid all the science-y stuff.
1) Bulb reaches End of Life stage
The most common fate of SOX lanterns is that the bulb reaches the End of Life stage. This stage can take many forms including; burnout at the end of the bulb, bulb going fully black, bulb running out of gases, or a gear problem.
The photo to the right shows a Thorn Beta 5 encountering End of Life. Although it looks as if the light has just turned on, it hasn't. The light turns on, and slightly flickers all night long until sunlight triggers the light to turn off again. Upon closer inspection, it would seem the inner glass had weakened and/or cracked allowing the gases to leak into the outer glass.
a) Bulb going fully black
Due to cost-cutting measures, an unforeseen manufacturing defect arose causing some bulbs to fail prematurely and go fully black when reaching, or just before reaching, End of Life stage. This process starts off slowly and in stages; the bulb develops black patches which then grow and eventually the bulb goes fully black. The bulb fails, and a pink flicker at the cathodes is the end of result.
b) Bulb running out of gases
In my experience, this is one of the slightly rarer EOL's, but can still happen nonetheless. When the bulb runs out of gases, it cannot ignite and therefore cannot warm up. The end result is an endless flickering until eventually the bulb does not ignite at all.
2) The ignitor is in a defective condition
A more rare occurance for the fate of SOX lights is that the ignitor has stopped working. In laymans terms, this means that nothing can strike the lamp to ignite and warm up. The lamp isn't burnt out, the ignitor has just refused to work and therefore the lamp sits dormant until its inevitable replacment.
3) The photocell is in a defective condition (dayburning)
When the photocell goes wrong, the lamp fails to switch off in the daytime - which leads to the light being on 24/7. This is known as dayburning. An example of this is shown in the photo on the right.
The solution to this problem is to replace the photocell with a known-working one or a brand new one.
4) There is no evident problem but the lamp fails to turn on
Long story short, the lamp has become "dormant". This happens when the required striking voltage is not met and therefore lamp does not turn on. The next time the photocell detects it is dark, the next day, the lamp may reach this required striking voltage status and the lamp will turn on without problem. In more severe cases, the lamp gear is to blame.
5) A faulty bulb
Sometimes, the bulb itself is faulty and needs replacing. The photo to the right shows an End of Life status bulb, but warms up to full colour and subsequently cools down to a warm red-orange colour.
Eventually, the lamp will not turn on at all which is what happened to this light. It has not yet been replaced with an LED lamp.
The same lamp a few days later
Sometimes, the lamp may warm up to yellow but later cool back down to yellow-orange, or not reach full brightness. This would indicate that the bulb is faulty and needs to be replaced.
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