DIY: 4-pin PL-L Lighting for Veg

I can't send private messages, but I'm intrigued by this DIY - what would you say the overall initial cost was and how much does it raise ambient temperatures? You only need one ballast per fixture regardless of the amount of bulbs used?

whatsgoodie said:

I can't send private messages, but I'm intrigued by this DIY - what would you say the overall initial cost was and how much does it raise ambient temperatures? You only need one ballast per fixture regardless of the amount of bulbs used?

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My source for the ballasts/bulbs was 1000bulbs.com and for a 4x55w PL-L setup (1 ballast, 4 - 55w bulbs, 4-sockets) I think I spent maybe $100 with shipping. Not bad for 220w of lighting! I already had the wiring and I used old shop lights for reflectors so they were "free". What's nice about this approach is you can use 1 ballast for 4 lights, 2 ballasts for 2 lamps or 1 ballast for 1 lamp or you can mix up the watts to get the right intensity where you need it - whatever works for you.

As far as temps, the veg room goes from ~68* lights off to ~71-73* lights on. That's with the 220w main vegging area + 120w (2 - 24w, 2 x 36w) PL-L lights on the nursery shelf. The bulbs get warm but I can touch them without burning myself.

Hope that helps - let me know if you have nay other questions.

yankeegreen said:

My source for the ballasts/bulbs was 1000bulbs.com and for a 4x55w PL-L setup (1 ballast, 4 - 55w bulbs, 4-sockets) I think I spent maybe $100 with shipping. Not bad for 220w of lighting! I already had the wiring and I used old shop lights for reflectors so they were "free". What's nice about this approach is you can use 1 ballast for 4 lights, 2 ballasts for 2 lamps or 1 ballast for 1 lamp or you can mix up the watts to get the right intensity where you need it - whatever works for you. .

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What ballast are you using? The biggest one I could find was a Fulham Workhorse 7 but that's only rated for three 55w bulbs though it's rated for four 50w bulbs.

The Fullham Workhorse8 supports up to 4 lamps ~220W total power. Their configuration chart also shows 3 x 55w as a supported configuration not 4 x 55w. I have read reports of others driving 4 55W lamps with this ballast, acknowledging that it voids the warranty. I did not read of any safety issues but that definitely runs the ballast to its max supported wattage! I had actually switched to two Workhorse 5 ballasts (1/2 cost of a WH8 each) to drive the 4 55W lamps in my setup.

yankeegreen said:

The Fullham Workhorse8 supports up to 4 lamps ~220W total power. Their configuration chart also shows 3 x 55w as a supported configuration not 4 x 55w. I have read reports of others driving 4 55W lamps with this ballast, acknowledging that it voids the warranty. I did not read of any safety issues but that definitely runs the ballast to its max supported wattage! I had actually switched to two Workhorse 5 ballasts (1/2 cost of a WH8 each) to drive the 4 55W lamps in my setup.

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Thanks, that explains it. I've been trying to decide if it's worth upgrading my 3 bulb solution to a 4 bulb or not and was wondering if their was a 4 bulb ballast that I had missed.

I've driven 4 55w bulbs with the WH8. Did it for a few months only, now the same ballast has been in use for over a year just driving 154w total. I'm moved from 220w of 6500k PLL down to 150w 4000k CMH because I started using a smaller space for vegging. I really want to go back to PLLs for vegging, my plants were much tighter with less heat. Their compactness made flowering more effective as well with what I use (combination of PLLs and LED). I just have to figure out how to make a fixture for this different veg space as it has an odd shape, which is fine for the CMH but harder to do with the ~22" long 55w bulbs.

In any case, it would likely be better to go with 2 WH5s than using a WH8 for 220w. Another advantage to this is that if one ballast fails, you still have enough light to get you through until you get a replacement whereas you might be out of luck with just one.

yankeegreen said:

and ability to use different wattage bulbs driven by a single ballast.

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Can you please expand on this? I don't know a thing about ballasts. Specially for PL-L's

This has inspired me to rethink how I wanna do my next set up. I love DIY