Did I fry my ballast?

[Joshsmit56001]

On my metal halide ballast I plugged the ground wire into the black wire and the black wire into the ground wire. The light flashed and then went out and now it won't light. Did I fry my ballast or what?

 

[Frick-n-Frags]

I don't think you can mess up a transformer ballast.
a transformer is a big coil of wire, so one end is as good as the other. If you switched the main AC wires, that shouldn't do anything.

Is the ground side grounded? maybe you blew out the breaker if the white wire is grounded on the primary side.


The secondary side is isolated AC which means that can be wired to the bulb either way

 

[Joshsmit56001]

It is a coralvue electronic ballast

 

[Joshsmit56001]

Bump

 

[BC Sparky]

If you hooked the hot to ground you would have just tripped the breaker (or GFCI). There would not have been any power on the actual ballast wires.

 

[Frick-n-Frags]

that's what I was thinking: dead-shorted the wall outlet.

 

[Joshsmit56001]

It didn't trip the breaker or the GFCI.

 

[shouldabenacowboy]

Do you have another bulb to try??


SBC

 

[Frick-n-Frags]

Well, if you didn't trip the mains, then you are down to ballast/bulb/wiring

yeah, definitely as a matter of procedure, check it with another bulb.

double check all the wiring. I could see a bad connection starting to conduct then fail and arc, killing the light.

that should give you your answer by examining the 3 components.

 

[am3gross]

but if he blew his bulb because of the wiring wont he jsut blow another bulb if he puts one in? i would check the wiring first. the ballast should make some kind of humming when it is turned on. i know mine do. i would switch the bulb in the last step of trouble shooting. that is just me though.

 

[Joshsmit56001]

I talked to Dave at CoralVue and he said that my ballast is fried. I guess it is time for a new one. The old one didn't look that good anyways so maybe this is a good thing, but don't tell the wife!

 

[Frick-n-Frags]

usually you check the bulb and wiring first since it is generally easier to check those that put in a second ballast.

I don't think you can fry a MH bulb like an incandescent.