Cheap UVC tube source?
Added 2025-02-01 19:42:17 +0000 UTCWith the peak of the pandemic past, the Chinese eBay warehouses appear to be dumping their stock locally, with this complete remote control UVC light being sold for less than £10 including shipping.
That makes them a good source of the tube alone, but it also comes with the base and two circuitry modules - which I reverse engineered of course.
Price may vary depending on where you are and if there's a sudden demand again. (One of the Patreon advantages of getting in first.)
Comments
Tube: https://a.aliexpress.com/_EJf7vmc Complete lamp: https://a.aliexpress.com/_EHFelO8 There's probably others, these were the first two in the search.
Alice Chapman
2025-02-06 09:44:39 +0000 UTCI think it's PLL (PL-L) style with a 2G11 base. It needs to be a four pin base to allow it to operate with the electronic ballast. The two pin versions usually have an integral glow bulb starter for traditional inductive ballasts.
Big Clive
2025-02-06 03:33:40 +0000 UTCHi Clive, thanks for this - as alway interesting tear-down! One question I wanted to ask is what is the designation of the socket which the lamp plugs into? I have some bulbs saved up from years ago which have the same base, i want to find a driver for them (they're white, not UV). Thanks in advance ;-)
Stephen Eyles
2025-02-05 21:58:16 +0000 UTCAbout 18 months ago I saw a similar product to "disinfect" a mobile phone, it looks like a mini ultrasonic bath, but it has two UV-C tubes. I bought more of them, because they're highly effective at erasing EPROMs and EPROM based legacy microcontrollers. No modification needed, just put the device in on its side, turn the unit on and let it run for 2-3 cycles and your device is blank, with a new 27C512 EPROM it took around 12 minutes as I recall.
Jason Mitchell
2025-02-03 07:13:36 +0000 UTCI was slightly curious and looked on ebay.co.uk and it seemed to be similar.
Jeff Thieleke
2025-02-03 04:11:46 +0000 UTCIn this case the resistor is in series with the zener, so the voltage will be a bit higher. The resistors probably nudge the voltage as well as sharing the current shunted.
Big Clive
2025-02-02 03:33:41 +0000 UTCI've not looked on AliX for them.
Big Clive
2025-02-02 03:32:54 +0000 UTCDo you see any of these lights on AliExpress?
Jeff Larson
2025-02-02 03:04:17 +0000 UTCDoesn't the 12 volt rail usually come off of the actual zener diode cathode rather than 68 ohm resistor?
Jeff Larson
2025-02-02 02:53:46 +0000 UTCCheapest I see for this model on US eBay is $35
John Kelley
2025-02-01 23:13:08 +0000 UTC
