M/H Ballast question

B

Briney Dave

New member
I am sure there is a ton of info out there on the subject of metal halide. However, I was hoping that someone could give me a much briefer overview on the subject. About 18 months ago I was running a duel 250 made by Hamilton. I had mogul base bulbs. I shut the M/H down while I went through moving to my new classroom and taking the tank apart to polish the acrylic etc.

Long story short, It was running fine when I shut it down but the ballast will not fire now. I took the cover off and found one magnet pack pretty chared in appearence along with it being rust brown. The other has no char look to it but is also pretty rusty looking.

I am guessing that I am out of luck with this unit and need to replace it.

there seems to be several different kinds of set ups in terms of pulse start, magnet, etc and a good range of prices too.

would some one please set me straight on which ballast is the best value in terms of both type and brand

thanks in advance for your time
David
 
What I gather about Metal Halide Ballasts

What I gather about Metal Halide Ballasts

IF you want versitility HQI ballasts offer the best punch for your bulb. The wattage applied to the bulb is higher and therefore overdrives them. You get heaps of light and they will drive almost every bulb out there. But bulb life will suffer. In other words 12months may even be pushing it. I have wave 7 HQI on 2 of my tanks and I cannot stress how much I love the look and growth.

If you want easy and reliable with almost total versitility you can go electronic. Icecaps and ARO's are rumoured to be made by same MFG. They do not overdrive bulbs. The color is slightly different than HQI with most bulb mfg. And double ended XM's sometimes have issues firing with them. At least that is my second hand knowledge. They use at or below the wattage specified.

The regular plain Jane (sorry to offend any janes out there) magnetics run 75% of the bulbs in single ended only. OR known as Probe. THe probe is used to initiate the arc that fires the bulb that has ignitor "onboard" the bulb.

The Pulse on the otherhand has an ignitor that fires a high voltage "pulse" directly across electrodes in bulb to fire the bulb. This allows radiums and ushios and some DE's to fire with them if I'm not mistaken.
http://www.advancetransformer.com/uploads/resources/HI-4020-R04_web.pdf See page 3 for description and source for info on probe vs pulse.

Some argue that the pulse and probe setups need to use their respective bulb counterparts and that life and bulbs if firing on the opposite light systems fail or greatly reduce their longevity.

If I were designing something for the long run that was keeping with versitility and lower power consumption I would go with Electronic. If I didn't care how much juice and bulb life and wanted alot of stomp out of lights for growth with versitility I'd go with HQI's.

I would avoid standard magnetic probe or pulse altogether if I were "investing" in any MH systems/parts due to the versitility issue and possible phase out down the road. Who knows?

FYI.
My display stuff is HQI.
My growout is about to go from old probe Magnetic to Electronic ARO's because the price was right. Otherwise I was about to go sunlight supply galaxy or Ice Cap. I like the plug and play aspect of sunlight stuff. And Ice Cap...well since everyone knows who they are you could sell the things in a second if needed.

Take what you can use and toss the rest.
 
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Other info I gathered and my electronic ballast info was courtesy of Reefcentral Moderator Carlos in a recent chat we had last week about lighting FYI.

Glad I could pass enough info to assist.
 
Glad you did!!

I am sort of stuck with price though. I priced out an exact replacement at Saltys for 189. an HQI will run near 350.

that is 300 more candy bars I have to sell to raise the difference. on the other hand I did not like the noise that Hamilton made. It always rattled and buzzed pretty loud. So buying the same problems over again does not make much sense.

oh well: candy bar anyone
 
great!! that will be one dollar plus 349.85 in shipping.

Man, I raised that cash much faster than I thought LOL

Oh my life is never easy, but I sure wouldn't trade it.
 
I would imagine that the ballast has name and numbers of the M58 that is loaded in that chassis and you can google for exact replacement.

Or

http://www.hellolights.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=174

This would probably get you back in business.


Or HQI upgrade the ballast guts with:

http://www.hellolights.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=165

And if you asked Hellolights tech support folks maybe they can affirm whether 2 of the HQI ballast would fit in your hammy case.

IF the rest of your hammy setup is wired in and in good shape. Might get you in business cheaper.


PLUS--------------it would be that much cheaper on Dave's Candy Bar Budget.
 
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He is a pretty good guy but not 350 for a candy bar good.

I just finished emailing Hello lights to ask if they thought their two ballasts would fit and what other parts I might need.

thanks for the tip
It may have saved me a ton of cash.
 
Oh Dave, I saw something about the Sunlight supply HQI's. Plug and play like I have...they claim to have an internal wall or baffle that separates the coil...or is it cap...anyway...one of them is separated from the ballast itself to insulate it from heat within the chassis. I forgot where I saw it. If you cannot fit that in maybe some kind of low output AC fan you can install inside to vent outward from the ballast locations to pull hot air before it can get to the other components within the hamilton case will have to be considered. Unless you can figure out the insulated wall or compartment setup like the sunlight HQI ballasts. Sorry to toss in a wrench. Stumbled on it and felt I should sing out. I'd find out myself But I have not had my Sunlight supply HQI ballasts open yet since A it works and B it's still under warranty. FYI before you make any purchases. Maybe it's a short term worry or maybe it's a long term extension of cap/coil servicable life with the HQI ballast setups.
 
Thanks for letting me know. So far no response from Hello regarding fitting two ballasts into my Hamilton box.
I also wondered if I needed to buy anything else beyond the ballast.
I will have an electrical guy from the district put it together and have no clue what the other parts are in the box to know if I have to swap those out too or what???
 
That HQI ballast combo is complete with everything you need to power each side. A pair of them and you're ready to go. Maybe get new wire nuts and redo grounds.

My old 250 loaded hamilton box had a pair of ballasts, a pair of coils and pair of capicitors. An on off switch, an output cord going out to the hood and a wall receptacle cord coming in.

Chances are good that yours is wired the same. Unless it's newer and they may have put a screw in replacable fuse receptacle. Probably 6amp to 10amp. Unless there is something really different going on. It should be the same.

Your concerns will be internal dimension and this possible heat aspect that sunlight has made steps to prevent in their plug and play HQI wave ballast. If it works you will have one heck of a light upgrade. Most of the bulb comparisons that I have noted with the HQI's result in 20 to 35% increased overall light output. See sanjays light info. http://www.reeflightinginfo.arvixe.com/ and input the various SE and DE bulb combos. The ballasts inside the PFO HQI used in Sanjay's test should be very close to exactly what you will get with ordering the hellolights raw ballast parts I believe.
 
This is great news!!, I am going to call them today. I am sure they get so busy at places like this that the techs never get around to email questions

I think we have the same set up. I just did not know the names of all the goodies hanging out in there. I can handle wiring a plug or even an outlet or two but I don't mess around much with stuff like this to know what I am talking about.
 
I got through to Hello lighting yesterday, the two ballasts will fit fine in my Hamilton box. This means that I saveed 150 bucks by not buying the exact same thing except for their metal box and switchs.

Thanks so much for the info and advice. You saved me a ton of cash
 
The new ballasts are too tall for the orginal lid so I have to wait for building maint. to build me a new cover. (I want them to do the wiring since that is district rules etc.) I was going to post that but forgot

The HQI ballast sits in the old frame great, the wire colors match, its going to be a snap for them to put together other than they are too tall

I will be adding a small fan to help with cooling too.

It sure beats 350 for the same thing but with a box
 
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