Experienced Electrician! Here to Answer Any and All Growroom Electrical Questions

Dutchman24

Active Member
I have a good electrical question... i know a good amount about electrical but need some help with this idea... if i have 2 400watt mh ballasts can i splice into the wires of one ballast before the socket and make a pigtail with two more wires running to the socket for the second light? because its wired in parallel it should still be getting all the same voltages i think...

I really appreciate your help on this one
 

IAm5toned

Well-Known Member
I have a good electrical question... i know a good amount about electrical but need some help with this idea... if i have 2 400watt mh ballasts can i splice into the wires of one ballast before the socket and make a pigtail with two more wires running to the socket for the second light? because its wired in parallel it should still be getting all the same voltages i think...

I really appreciate your help on this one
no. you will burn up the ballast transformer and/or starter/cap... if it even works at all.

the ballasts are rated for wattage. exceed the wattage and bad things happen.
 

thc~me

Active Member
i have a white/black coming from my reflector and white black and green from my cord. I assume that I wire white to white and black/green to black? just wanna check.

thanks
 

mrmadcow

Well-Known Member
i have a white/black coming from my reflector and white black and green from my cord. I assume that I wire white to white and black/green to black? just wanna check.

thanks
no, the green is ground & should be attached to a metal part of the hood
 

DMC65

Member
My question involves relocating an outlet from 18" to about 5' in the same bay to get it out of the way of water spills. The outlet is about 20 years old and the top recepticle turns on/off from a wallswitch. It must also support about 3 more outlets downstream because they stopped working when i disconnected the outlet. I have one 4 conductor (b,wh,r, grnd) and 1 3 conductor (w,b, grnd). on the recepticle i have red and white from 4 cunductor on top . the bottom has both black wires and the nuestral white from the 3 conductor. grounds are spliced and connected to ground screw. my plan is to run the same wires from the new locatio to the old and wire nut the connections. i would terminate the new recepticle the same as the old. is this the recommended method? are the new recepticles wired this way? also could i use a GFI outlet this way?
 

mrmadcow

Well-Known Member
My question involves relocating an outlet from 18" to about 5' in the same bay to get it out of the way of water spills. The outlet is about 20 years old and the top recepticle turns on/off from a wallswitch. It must also support about 3 more outlets downstream because they stopped working when i disconnected the outlet. I have one 4 conductor (b,wh,r, grnd) and 1 3 conductor (w,b, grnd). on the recepticle i have red and white from 4 cunductor on top . the bottom has both black wires and the nuestral white from the 3 conductor. grounds are spliced and connected to ground screw. my plan is to run the same wires from the new locatio to the old and wire nut the connections. i would terminate the new recepticle the same as the old. is this the recommended method? are the new recepticles wired this way? also could i use a GFI outlet this way?
sounds like you got it. the red wire is the switched leg so if you use a new outlet,you will have to cut the little metal jumper between the top screw & bottom screw on the side that has the red & black wires or to give up the switch, wirenut off the red & just attach the blacks to the 1 side.
if going w/ GFI, read the instructions,it will tell you how to wire so as to protect the outlets downstream- the wire w/ no red will be to the outlets "downstream"
 

DMC65

Member
Thanks for the feed back Mrmadcow. I'll follow your advice and close off the red since i dont need the swithed outlet anymore. ++ rep!!
 
Hey this question may be stupid but here's mine:
ok for my growing restrictions I have to use car batteries to power my grow project
I was hoping I would be able to attach one of those power strips to the batteries so I can just plug in the seperte components of my grow op ino it
is there a simple way to do this, making it easy to switch out the batteries?

Also, I am planning on using a 30 watt cfl flood light per plant (x16) and a hydroponic system (ebb and flow) so how long do you think the car batteries will last (or the amps the give out)
 

Confidential Herb

Active Member
I'm living in a 5000 square foot home. There is always lights in a couple rooms running. This is my first grow so I'm trying to be as cautious as possible! Is 6 42watt cfls going to tip anything off to the electric company?? How much is this going to affect my electricity bill by a 18/6 for four weeks and a 12/12 for nine weeks? Let me know thanks!
 

TylerHTC

Active Member
Hey I got a question. Can you wire CFLs to a computer power supply? As in wiring one 12v and one ground to the contacts on the bulb granted that you have enough wattage. I have wired a lamp cord to a CFL before but was wondering if this would work before i went tearing up a power supply.
 

mrmadcow

Well-Known Member
Hey this question may be stupid but here's mine:
ok for my growing restrictions I have to use car batteries to power my grow project
I was hoping I would be able to attach one of those power strips to the batteries so I can just plug in the seperte components of my grow op ino it
is there a simple way to do this, making it easy to switch out the batteries?

Also, I am planning on using a 30 watt cfl flood light per plant (x16) and a hydroponic system (ebb and flow) so how long do you think the car batteries will last (or the amps the give out)
not at all pratical.first you will need a power inverter to kick the voltage up to 115 volts AC. just the lights will draw over 40 amps from the battery so it will last a few hrs at most,next car batteries are not made to be used that way so you will be buying a new 1 every few days
sorry,but like I said,not pratical
Hey I got a question. Can you wire CFLs to a computer power supply?
no it wont work & please stop YELLING !!!
 

justlearning73

Well-Known Member
Ok I have a question for the wise electical people on here. I have 4 T-5 lights. they all have a 6 inch jumper to conect all together. My question is this: Can I make the jumper longer with out damaging or causing any problems? I want to splice another wire to make the jumper oh about 3 to 4 feet long. Is this doable? thanks for any and all feed back.
 

buggin69

Active Member
I have a no BS question for anybody that knows the answer.

I have a dual speed twin blower fan from an OTR microwave. I got it bare with the wire harness cut. It has a loose diagram (not a schematic) on the sticker. White is common, blue is high, yellow is low. If I hook up to white/blue or white/yellow the fan hums until I spin it by hand at which point it takes off and runs like it's supposed to... whether it's high or low. It also has an orange and red wire and if you touch them together for a moment after plugging it in while it's humming it will start to spin on it's own... then separate them and it spins to full speed. This is obviously wrong though. On the diagram they go from the motor to a C. On the sticker elsewhere it says CAP 10uF. I'm assuming the C is a capacitor.
Now for the question. I have a capacitor from a different microwave. This one came from the high side of the transformer on the magnetron. It's a 1.05 uF 2100V cap (and it's huge). If I hook red and orange to opposite sides of the cap and then apply power it spins on it's own and quickly makes it's way to full speed just like I'd expect. Here comes the question for real. Is this ok? Do I need to find exactly a 10uF cap? I may be able to. I got sick while parts searching tonight and had to stop short. Didn't know I'd need a cap at all just happened to have this one from a microwave i took apart before. But if this is okay then it's certainly okay with me.

If I do need to get the exact right thing and you know where I can order it please point me to it.

Thanks ahead of time.
 

buggin69

Active Member
Ok I have a question for the wise electical people on here. I have 4 T-5 lights. they all have a 6 inch jumper to conect all together. My question is this: Can I make the jumper longer with out damaging or causing any problems? I want to splice another wire to make the jumper oh about 3 to 4 feet long. Is this doable? thanks for any and all feed back.

Yes, just use a cord sufficient enough to handle all 4 lights. When you wire them in a normal environment you are just attaching them to a longer wire. It's no different. Just use wire caps and a large enough gauge wire. You didn't say how many watts but I imagine 14 or even 16 would be fine
 
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