salvatore
Member
Just bought two of these and have a question about wiring.
Theres a diagram on the ballast and it seemed pretty straightforward to wire things up. I made sure all of the connections were secure, made sure there were no frays in the wiring, made sure the ballasts were secured in the bottom of the stand and had plenty of ventilation, et cetera.
I hooked everything up on Saturday afternoon and from 3:00pm to 9:00pm everything lit as expected. Today the MHs came on at 3:00pm as normal and around 7:30pm or so one of them went out. Thinking I had a bad bulb, I turned off the power, waited for them to cool down, and switched the bulbs to see if thats what happened.
The one bulb that went out in the one socket didnt fire in the other socket, and the good bulb fired right up. I waited about ten minutes or so and both lights were on and working.
Twenty minutes later one went out again and didnt come back on. I triple checked all of the wiring to make sure there was no moisture or loose connections or anything out of the ordinary. There was no smoke, the ballasts werent making any noise, and Im running out of things to check.
Before setting this up, I took one of the ballasts to Home Depot and told them what I was doing. They said I needed 14 gauge wire, and only afterward did I see the Hellolights site saying I needed 18 gauge wire. Is that significant enough of a difference to cause something like this?
Also, the Hellolights had this on their MH FAQ :
Q. My bulb fires then goes out, what's going on?
A. Metal halide bulbs are very finicky when they are fired the first few times. Usually, within the first 100 hours, you will notice slight color shifts, etc. Also, the arc tubes sometimes will go on and off. Just leave them in. How MH bulbs will NOT restrike until they are cooler, so just leave them plugged in.
My question is this:
If the above is true, should I just leave everything plugged in and let the lights do their thing? Or should I strip it back down and rewire with 18 gauge?
Thanks, and sorry for the long post.
Theres a diagram on the ballast and it seemed pretty straightforward to wire things up. I made sure all of the connections were secure, made sure there were no frays in the wiring, made sure the ballasts were secured in the bottom of the stand and had plenty of ventilation, et cetera.
I hooked everything up on Saturday afternoon and from 3:00pm to 9:00pm everything lit as expected. Today the MHs came on at 3:00pm as normal and around 7:30pm or so one of them went out. Thinking I had a bad bulb, I turned off the power, waited for them to cool down, and switched the bulbs to see if thats what happened.
The one bulb that went out in the one socket didnt fire in the other socket, and the good bulb fired right up. I waited about ten minutes or so and both lights were on and working.
Twenty minutes later one went out again and didnt come back on. I triple checked all of the wiring to make sure there was no moisture or loose connections or anything out of the ordinary. There was no smoke, the ballasts werent making any noise, and Im running out of things to check.
Before setting this up, I took one of the ballasts to Home Depot and told them what I was doing. They said I needed 14 gauge wire, and only afterward did I see the Hellolights site saying I needed 18 gauge wire. Is that significant enough of a difference to cause something like this?
Also, the Hellolights had this on their MH FAQ :
Q. My bulb fires then goes out, what's going on?
A. Metal halide bulbs are very finicky when they are fired the first few times. Usually, within the first 100 hours, you will notice slight color shifts, etc. Also, the arc tubes sometimes will go on and off. Just leave them in. How MH bulbs will NOT restrike until they are cooler, so just leave them plugged in.
My question is this:
If the above is true, should I just leave everything plugged in and let the lights do their thing? Or should I strip it back down and rewire with 18 gauge?
Thanks, and sorry for the long post.
