I think I've seen this with magnetic RS ballasts in the cold.. https://www.lighting-gallery.net/gallery/displayimage.php?pos=-266800

Yeah, even with their bigger 10kW one it still uses 2.45GHz, which could definitely be a problem. I would assume that some RF can escape, but I have no idea.

You could probably just have the cavity made by an online CNC service, I am sure whatever is in there isn't worth trying to figure out how to make myself with a manual mill lol.

You are fully capable of connecting with friends if and when this matters - As seen here whey you came to write to us

May that be the sort of friendship you might be missing, overlooking, or were unable to find in your real life contact circle of people ?



When your friends are not too close by all the time like in college, which forces you to interact with them at times you don't get to choose

A real best friend at our age (i'm at about the same age as you) is the one who is open for you to chime in when you have something of interest (good or bad), even if sometimes you dont even contact at all for a long time, and sometimes a short and intense burst of contact all at once

He does not "require" (or make you feel like he requires or expects) your presence at some frequency just to show that you exist, like the meaning of friend in the understanding of young kids. That sort of contact eventually may evolve to e.g. "the company at the pub" for some people, but clearly this isn't the sort of contact you are missing

So long as you two really consider each other friends and try to be so, it'll just work out. With all your emotionality (and he might too), all the things you might think to be huge mistakes but aren't, come as you are

It's not a friend intended to evolve into being your girlfriend. So it does not matter too much who this friend is (he/she/age) and how (on what occasion, based on what interests, ...) you found each other



Maybe you may define (for yourself, without us) what you are missing, then you will have better abilities to find it

This is one of those completely deceptively simple things.
I am sure cavity design is well protected under company secrets and that you have to machine it to really tight tolerances to get it to work.

I also wonder how big the spurious emissions are. They're using a microwave oven magnetron in one of their videos. If the system leaks too much RF, you can put an entire block of houses without wifi.


If you want to make it yourself, you need a milling machine (ideally CNC) and a lot of experience in designing UHF/SHF cavities and wave guides.

I like Spring! Firstly, that’s my birthday season, secondly It’s when all the flowers come out (and that’s always nice!), thirdly it’s sometimes cold and sometimes warm, unlike summer when it is almost always hot and in winter when it is always Cold. 

@rapidstart_12 — I see. Looks very nicely done. Now I await the "final" setup pics. 

For your reference, these lamps need about 280-300mA and an arc voltage drop of about 55V for proper operation.

It is also important to keep in mind that there are other 13W PL lamps sold in North America that are electrically different from the GX23 base lamps, which use the offset pin G24D1 base instead. If you find a ballast that requires the G24D1 base 13W PL lamps, you do not want to use it for the GX23 base 13W PL lamps as the G24D1 base lamps as they require an operating current of about 170mA and an arc voltage drop of about 100V or so.

I recommend searching Facebook Marketplace or OfferUp whenever you can. You should find some good fluorescent stuff there if you are patient enough.

@Maxim - Thank you for the feedback!

As far as sourcing goes, I got this lot of fixtures from facebook marketplace after waiting over a year and a half for a decent listing in my area to become available. You’d think F40T12 strip lights would be a pretty easily obtained fixture, but to get so many matching vintage ones is surprisingly difficult. The listing included the seven 1988 Lithonia C240s used in the install along with two similar 1987 units, a cheap shoplight, and a newer wraparound with broken diffuser, plus a bunch of newer and older lamps.

For switching, I just have the fixtures plugged into a small switch adapter thingy that plugs into an outlet. This is temporary until I can get a proper wiring setup installed (was planning to install the fixtures after that was done but decided to do them before). The fixtures are internally wired for two switches, but everything it just tied to one plug for the moment.

@rapidstart_12 — couple of questions: where did you source these from, and how are they switched on/off?

Superb install!