Truu's electrical help thread.

Howdy folks.

This thread will be dedicated to any of your electrical needs. Whether it be a question about your growing setup, or if you just need help around the house. I have many years of electrical experience in residential, commercial, and industrial fields.

Just ask your question as detailed as possible, throw in some pics if needed. The more info I can get, the better I can understand what you need. It is also a good idea to let me know if you are from over seas, for I am not lol.

 

[bobo1965]

thank you very much for your time

 

[Truu]

Hey dude. Well I'm slightly confused about your question. I have never had any run-ins with eddy currents. There should be nothing in your ballast or light that should have enough eddy current for a cause of concern.

Eddy currents will create a power loss when varying types of various highly conductive metals are in contrast with essy currents. If I'm way off your subject here (and I very may well be due to eddy currents being something not often a concern) please let me know and maybe I can help you more.

 

[The Dude]

Well I just ment that if needing to rewire say a 1000W ballast and or lighting system.Are the standard safety protocals enough since Im guessing now that the currents are plenty low to avoid any real eddy's then.And no your spot on I just have a hard time putting things into short explinations ,sorry for that. So since Im not dealing with 440Hz sytem or anything Im good then.

 

[Truu]

Ya dude you're good. Gal dern a 440hz system. Geez I've never touched anything like that. Oh yes 440hz I could see eddy currents making a huuuuge difference on a circuit.

You should be fine on the ballast

 

[The Dude]

Sweet thanks Brother!!

 

[tbart]

Truu - really good thread, you've definitely caught my attention. If i could make a suggestion, re electrical failures with those inexpensive digital timers. I've used intermatic mechanical timers that are contained in their own little metal cabinets on furnaces etc.

for the grow "room" i'm building i had a little intermatic digital timer, model DT620CL that i'd bought few years back (love the battery backup so i don't loose the timer schedule if power goes out). Decided to use two timers so went to buy another of the same, and found intermatic now offers both the original model and a newer model, the DT620, basically for a few bucks cheaper (earlier one had a lifetime warranty). The part i think folks might want to think about, i noticed one of the reviews on the newer model, the owner indicated it had apparently failed and was in the process of starting a fire (owner was nearby and smelled the plastic burning). For the heck of it, i mentioned that to a bud that i knew was using a similiar digital timer and kind of flipped out when he said his had already melted down. The amazon reviewer said he was running 250W draw with "Tungsten" lighting (i have no idea if that influenced the event as i'm fairly electric illiterate), but my bud runs about 600 watts of incandescent lighting off his. Those timers, both the earlier version & the newer one, are 15 amp rated so they should have handled considerably more with ease . I don't believe in coincidences and learning about two failures that could have resulted in fires, in the same week bothered me and got me wondering how common an issue it is.

I'm sure the surge strip would shut down at some point, but have to wonder if it'd shut down before the unit was dripping burning plastic. I only mentioned the brand (intermatic) as it's a long established mfgr and i had assumed they'd be decent quality vs the chinese copies (even though they're all probably made in china).

As i'd already bought the second DT620CL, i didn't want to throw them away, so i basically copied what intermatic had done with the mechanical units i've used, and modified some metal boxes (an old first aid kit and a military ammo box) to keep the units in, so that in the event of it sparking / melting down, no burning plastic can drip on flammable material etc. Just so i sleep better.

old circuit breaker panel boxes would really be ideal for the same purpose though

anyway, fwiw

again, great thread - I'm definitley following it

 

[crispt9]

I'm new here, and this is quite nice!
Truu you're a real gentleman!

Such a complete community

 

[NikaVolkova]

HI I really need some help... I moved to Russia from over a year ago and would like to use my old 400w hps ballast, I have been using it on a converter... not too safe.
I rewired the ballast to 220 with a good high amp europlug"the dam capacitor shocked the crap out of me.:hot: so now I have come to you
I dont want to burn down my Giant soviet block. But my question is will the ballast run on 50 Hz? because the USA is 60...
My girlfriends thought I was crazy!!! because I was going to plug it in.
Thank you!! and sorry for the unnecessary info.

 

[A4]

The difference in incoming hertz shouldn't matter if it is truly a digital ballast but I would contact the manufacturer to be on the safe side.

 

[NikaVolkova]

OHHHH it's not a digital ballast!!! is that bad? I'm not good with electricity.