DIY Doctor UK DIY Forums

Hi, hoping someone can guide me in the right direction for a fix here.

I have a bathroom mirror that has a G10q T9 32w Circular Fluorescent tube in it - which needed replacing, I bought a new tube and installed it. Initially I thought the sensor switch was faulty, passing my hand over the switch didnt always make the light come on.

I checked the connections, same problem persisted, until eventually passing my hand over the sensor I could hear the click i.e. sensor switch but the light was no longer coming on.

After writing the above, maybe it is the tube if it of poor quality or faulty? In that I noticed where the white connection is (see photos) there were gaps between the glass tube and white plastic....I will try find the old bulb and see if this is normal. Otherwise could it be the ballast or is it a transformer of sorts?

Any suggestions appreciated.

I see nothing wrong with the set up. However the electronic ballast units can be damaged with prolonged use of a faulty tube.

Where I worked we used a lot of HF ballasts and because of the ballast failing when tubes blow we had a maintenance program where tubes were replaced after set time and we did not wait for them to fail.

However I have just one HF ballast in my house at the top of the stairs which is an emergency light so auto lights with power failure and when the tube failed after 20 years use it did not damage the ballast.

If it were mine I would bypass the inferred switch to test and if still a problem then swap ballast unit. However in the past I have found the price for replacement parts can exceed the price of a new unit so not sure if really worth spending much time trying to repair?