Cool lamp! Looks like it had a price sticker/barcode on it at one point...does this have cathode guards?
Any idea when ACE switched from Philips to GE?

Just went & checked, it does have guards.
I have no idea when they switched over to GE (I've got a couple other Ace lamps & believe all are GE)

Looks like it had a simple price sticker (which would make since that was kinda before barcodes at those smaller stores)

I have two generations of GE-made ACE lamps...the only working one I have though is a F40CW (halophosphate) one though...

cool lamp! i have an F15 blackender westy lamp that says ACE, wonder if any F40 ACE blackenders exist? also i have a pair of ACE F40s that are Phillips but have a black etch and is a bit smaller

Not this style of etch but the newer one?
I remember there used to be a couple ACE PAR lamps at my Mom's house that must have been Philips-made judging by the etch but they burned out...and got replaced by GE-made ACE ones...

A_lights: That ACE F15 blackender westy is a cool find. I'd love to see a F40 blackender

GEsoftwhite100watts: The other GE Ace's I have are modern green-etch type

I have several ACE lamps at my house in Alaska that have the old F40CW ordering code (and thus are halophosphate) and several "Universal Deluxe" post-EPACT ones but, again, only one works.
And I just had a pair of the green-etch ones last less than 20 minutes! (I think; will try them in another light later). Any ideas why they would suddenly fade out, flicker/strobe a bit for a minute, then just glow at the ends? I've wiggled them in their sockets (while on) but that still doesn't help...haven't tried them in another light yet, though.

Sounds like they're possibly defective
I'd try them on an electronic IS ballast & see if they've lost vacuum or something...

Update: One of the lamps had a crack...will take em back to Ace and see if they can be exchanged...
Is the fixture this lamp pictured above in a Power Products shoplight? Mine (with the old Philips lamps) have that USE STANDARD 40 WATT LAMPS ONLY. ENERGY SAVING LAMPS MAY TRIP AUTOMATIC RESETTING THERMAL CUTOUT sticker as well.

Probably cracked all along...and then the crack grew once it got hot while running

I don't remember what the shoplight used in this pic was. Could easily be a Power Products one

the guy i was relamping a walgreens with accidentally smacked the lamp he was removing into the lamp still on and cracked it i soon saw a purple glow as it got it and the lamp got darker from one end to the other as the air got in, it was pretty cool, lamp was a GE ultramax 28W/835

These suddenly were dimmer, then as I watched they just faded out...
Xmaslight, can you look at a Power Products light if you have one and get a pic? Then I can tell if they're like the ones at my house...

Guess you saw the moment when it lost vacuum. Were you able to exchange them?

I'll have to look & see if I can find that light (I know its laying around somewhere, just not suer of its exact location)

Yep, we were! We'll see how the (identical) replacement lasts...
Oh and BTW I went to a ReStore today for the first time and scored some nice old LOA preheat CFLs!

nice!

Yep! Unfortunately one of the circline adapters doesn't seem to be functional...will investigate it further later...

probably the starter...if you have an undercabinet light with wired in starter you can steal that and wire nut it into the circline adapter and convert the other light to normal starter! thats what i do

I don't...and the lamp appears to have no filaments left at the end yet a Philips 22w cool white circline did nothing (no BANG!) yet on a different adapter glowed at the ends as the starter fired rapidly then the glow stopped and later the lamp cracked? Do you think it's a shorted ballast on the nonworking one? At the rate I'm going I should get a modern, cheap, Indonesian-made GE circline for testing purposes...

are the adapters magnetic preheat and do they have replaceable starters?

Preheat and yes the starters can be replaced "If you know what you're doing" as they're in the lamp plug.