Event logs empty?

I had an empty security log on a servr. There is an article about how to delete the dud .evt log but I think it requires some sort of special reboot to get to it. The event logs are locked as part of the start up process. Well that problem server was overwriting system logs that I needed so I bumped up the size to about 4 gigs. While I was there I bumped up the security log size and I deleted the old log. Instantly an event was recorded in the event log.

I guess I now vaguely recall seeing this problem and a deltion of the log fromthe event viewer interface fixed the problem.