Fluorescent Starter Gripper

[awemawson]

My workshop has a lot of twin 6 foot fluorescent fittings, many of which are mounted quite high. (I know I should replace them with LEDs but the capital cost is horrendous !)

I find extracting and inserting the starters extremely difficult, especially when perched high on a ladder on tip toe! The problem is that very little of the starter protrudes, and reaching it you have to reach past the tube which sometimes has proved impossible. I've tried various bodges to grip the starter but none were satisfactory.

Today again I had to change a starter so I decided to solve the issue once and for ever. All the starters I've come across have two dimples in them, presumably to engage a special tool, but I've never been able to source that tool

So - you've got a 3D printer - print one 

Didn't take long and the result makes the job SO much easier 

[RussellT]

Very good Andrew. 

Last time I changed mine I bit the bullet and bought electronic starters for them all.  I've not had to replace any yet.

Russell

[efrench]

From the title, I thought you wanted a fluorescent handle on the starter

[PK]

Re capital cost.  We just went through the process. For lights that are on 9-5 5 days a week, payback was 6 months.
Your numbers may vary this by a bit I suppose, but for us it worked out like this:

2000lm LED tube (there are many, many cheap, crap, low output tubes out there, avoid them) $20
Measured power saving per tube 30W
Price of electricity $0.38 / Kw hr

That's assuming that you do it all at once. if you wait for the old tubes to fail then your effective cost is a little less because you were going to buy a replacement tube anyway.
We went the whole hog and removed the ballast and starter from the lights to scavenge a few extra mW

We've backed this up with our energy monitoring system which shows us saving about (but just under) the amount we expected.