HID lighting idea....

[olds350racer]

Earlier today I was at Home Depot and looked at the following light:
Link here (I think this is the same one)
This light is a mercury vapor light with a independent ballast and looking through the documentation, it appears to be ANSI H39. My understanding is that this SHOULD run a 6500K Iwasaki bulb.
So for the $60.00 plus the cost of a couple Iwasakis... I could gut the light fixture and use the ballast and mogul socket to add 350w MH to my tank and go straight actinic with my VHO. I know there has to be a flaw in my plan ... can anyone tell me where the flaw is?
Thanks in advance.

 

[olds350racer]

I just tried the link... it didn't work. You can go to www.homedepot.com and do a search for "Mecury Vapor". It's the 175w one.

 

[Shade00]

Walmart sells that light for $22. I don't know that the ballast is capable of running a halide, despite using the same socket. It's almost worth the $22 just to find out, though. Do let us know if you give it a try.

 

[BruiseAndy]

How loud is it?

 

[olds350racer]

BruiseAndy, you have a good point about the noise. It probably sounds like a finishing sander. I'll pick one up this weekend and let you know. If it's not too loud, I'll start looking for a cheap, used Iwasaki bulb to see if it will fire it.

 

[Fishboy1230]

Look in my gallery for pictures of my metal halide homedepot clearance mh!

 

[adnup]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9666226#post9666226 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Shade00
Walmart sells that light for $22. I don't know that the ballast is capable of running a halide, despite using the same socket. It's almost worth the $22 just to find out, though. Do let us know if you give it a try.

I saw that one in wally world also..$22.98

 

[Fishboy1230]

When taking one of my often trips to Lowes I found a 70 watt home/commercial sucurity MH light on sale for $35 with bulb!
All i did was I rewired the metal halides mougel base ( good quality socket too!) I rewired the ballast output to a grounded extention cord that attached to a extra lamp ( Hamilton Bay Track Lighting Lamp) as a reflector and put the good quality ceramic socket in. Also I moved the ballast into a extra computer power supply box that I had laying around that had a built in Powercord socket and a power switch. And wahla i have a wonderful MH fixture for very measly $35 which is normally less than the cost of a MH bulb!


Recently i added a fan to the ballast's container ( the computer power supply box) I used a cheap computer fan mounted it to suck air out of the box and in the vents. I hooked the fan to a small dc power supply that plugs into the wall.

 

[Fishboy1230]

Actually it was $15 dollars for a 70watt,

Pics

Box

After modification over tank

Ballast was transfered into this used pc powersupply case with fan

Hope someone else can benifit from this!:rollface:

 

[olds350racer]

Well, I just picked up one of these from Wal-Mart... wired it up... and it's as quiet as any magnetic ballast... a little hum during warm up, but that's it. BruiseAndy, were you questioning physical noise or electronic noise. Now I need to find an old Iwasaki 6500k bulb for cheap to plug in and see the results. I'll post as soon as I find a donor bulb.
PS- FishBoy, that's a great idea for using the old PC PS case as a ballast case... I finally have a use for all those fried PSs.

 

[Shade00]

My store has a ton of old 10kk bulbs, but I unfortunately can't spend the $23 bucks to buy the fixture and rip it apart. =/ That money is going to a new tank. If it comes down to it, I can probably mail you one olds350racer, if you absolutely cannot find one.

 

[hahnmeister]

You know, sometimes people get so cheap that I wonder how then they can afford the salt for this hobby...

 

[olds350racer]

Anyone in particular, hahnmeister?

Shade00, I appreciate the offer. I'm going to see it I can't find something local, but I might take you up on the offer if I can't find one relatively soon.

 

[olds350racer]

I haven't found any used Iwasaki bulbs lately, so if anyone has used Iwasaki bulb that's past it's useful life (but still fires), let me know.