tan_man_dan

I just bought an Alisun 800C tanning canopy from craigslist for $50. It is from 1993 and is designed for 8 f71 100w bulbs.

A few questions:

1. Most of the bulbs in the machine are Wolff velocity plus 120W, not the 100W the manufacturer specifies. The two center bulbs are 100W Wolff velocity plus. Is the extra wattage going to create problems with the ballasts or other hardware?

2. When I first fired it up one of the 120w bulbs did not light. When I swapped a functioning bulb into that spot it also failed to light, so I assume there is a problem with the starter or ballast. How should I go about troubleshooting this?

3. One of the bulbs (originally in the spot that failed to light) is dim in the middle. Does this mean it is failing? Can I just replace one bulb at a time? I'm on a tight budget.

4. Is $50 a good price? Or did I just buy a piece of garbage?

tan_man_dan

Did some more reading, I'll try taking it apart and swapping starters. They really didn't making servicing this thing easy....

tan_man_dan

BTW, anyone know how these things come apart?

My machine looks like the one in this ad:

http://lansing.craigslist.org/for/1724304246.html

Brian Oshman

They are 100 watt. That is just marketing. Real 120 watt lamps are 79" long. Wattage is consumption, not output. UV is measured in mW/cm² so only roughly 15 to 20 mW (milliwatts) are being output from the lamp in tanning power and the rest is a by product of visible light, x-ray, and infrared.

The ballast determines the wattage, the lamp wattage determines its tolerance to the operating range of the ballast that is driving it. It does not work like incandescent lamps, any lamp will only run at 100 watts in there. Plan on spending eternity under there because the lamps are probably shot. They will still light but not have any real useful output. Besides, there are only 8 lamps. Not too many photons being emitted from such a small array.

If you want to spice it up a little PM or call or e mail me for an order. One lamp at a time is a waste because it will cost three times as much to ship the lamp than the cost of it and it will cost the same in shipping to ship all of them as it will just one. Replacing one lamp is a waste of time. You will need to replace them all or you are just wasting your time and money.

tan_man_dan

Thats interesting. Do you have a price list and shipping info you can PM me?

After some fiddling around I've ruled out wiring and it now appears one of the ballasts is bad. Looks like a standard electronic 10 pin, 2 lamp ballast, but it only lights one of the lamps.

Deciding whether to repair it or get one on ebay....

tan_man_dan

Anyone know if all of the 10 pin 100W electronic ballasts are interchangeable?

eg:

http://cgi.ebay.com/1ea-Tanning-Bed-...#ht_500wt_1182

http://cgi.ebay.com/Electronic-Balla...#ht_642wt_1165

http://cgi.ebay.com/Tanning-Bed-Ball...#ht_757wt_1165

These all look like they'd work to me.

Brian Oshman

Any 100 watt 120 volt ballast will work. Call for lamp pricing. I may have a couple of ballasts for that laying around too.

tan_man_dan

I'm not so sure the lamps are shot. After the first time I swapped lamps and there was one dim one (briefly) that stopped happening. All the lamps look the same and there is no odd discoloration.

Is there any way to see how good lamps are without a meter or actually tanning in the machine?

I'll email the original owner and see if they have any info on the lamp usage.

Brian Oshman

The lamps are crap, plus they are original. The darkness you experienced is normal with a cold lamp. It evens out once it is warmed up.

You only have eight lamps in that thing so to get it to work in a reasonable amount of time consider relamping it.

Only way to tell what is actually going on is to meter it and tan in it. The lamps are weak, cover their a$$ on liability, tan everyone type of lamp. Very, very weak. Jay Ewe En Kay!®

Brian Oshman

The lamps are crap, plus they are original. The darkness you experienced is normal with a cold lamp. It evens out once it is warmed up.

You only have eight lamps in that thing so to get it to work in a reasonable amount of time consider relamping it.

Only way to tell what is actually going on is to meter it and tan in it. The lamps are weak, cover their a$$ on liability, tan everyone type of lamp. Very, very weak. Jay Ewe En Kay!®