Growroom Electricity and Wiring

[rives]

Watts are watts, regardless of voltage. That is why the power company uses kwh as the basis for billing. You will also have ballast losses - probably somewhere on the order of 5-10%, and a very minimal loss from the step-down transformer. I take it that there is no neutral with the circuit?

 

[smoke_tayo]

so i will have 3520watts to work with on a 20amp 220v circuit, even if i convert some of the voltage to 110 with a transformer?

if i am using 220v circuit for the 220 ballasts, why will there be a loss? not really sure what loss refers to actually. do you mean in terms of efficiency or loss in the capacity of load?

i believe there is a neutral in the circuit, but i will have to double check. how should i address either way?

thanks rives!

 

[smoke_tayo]

sorry, accidental repost.

 

[rives]

so i will have 3520watts to work with on a 20amp 220v circuit, even if i convert some of the voltage to 110 with a transformer?

if i am using 220v circuit for the 220 ballasts, why will there be a loss? not really sure what loss refers to actually. do you mean in terms of efficiency or loss in the capacity of load?

i believe there is a neutral in the circuit, but i will have to double check. how should i address either way?

thanks rives!

Yes, the total number of watts doesn't change.

Ballasts are not 100% efficient. If you plug them into a kill-a-watt, for instance, you will see that your 600w fixture actually pulls somewhere around +/-650 watts.

If you have a neutral available (a 4-wire 240v circuit would include (2) 120v hot legs, (1) neutral, and (1) ground, and a 3-wire 240v circuit leaves out the neutral), then the circuit could be split up to give you both 240v and 120v. 240v is derived by putting the load between (2) 120v legs, and 120v comes from hooking the load between one of the hot legs and the neutral.

 

[LEDSmoke]

Could you recommend any beginner books on electrical systems?
I'm looking into wiring a whole room and I know nothing about running electricity.

 

[rives]

Could you recommend any beginner books on electrical systems?
I'm looking into wiring a whole room and I know nothing about running electricity.

I believe that Home Depot has a couple of books that would give you a good start. I don't see them on a site search, but I recall seeing them in the store. Ugly's is a good, basic reference book, but won't give you much on techniques. I would not recommend a copy of the NEC (National Electrical Code) - they are confusing even to journeyman electricians. Grainger carries a book on residential wiring, but it sells for $125! You might check the library if there is one near you.

 

[LEDSmoke]

Awesome! Thank you for the quick reply.
I might attempt it regardless. I gotta run two 30 amp wires. one for a window ac and the other for a Master Light controller. Is this as simple as it sounds, or could I potentially harm myself?

 

[rives]

Awesome! Thank you for the quick reply.
I might attempt it regardless. I gotta run two 30 amp wires. one for a window ac and the other for a Master Light controller. Is this as simple as it sounds, or could I potentially harm myself?

The simplicity of the job depends on what needs to be done and your level of competence and/or ability to follow directions. Yes, you could potentially harm (or kill) yourself as well as burn your house down. Electricity is not to be dealt with lightly - done properly, it is as close to "tame" energy as we have available. If not, it can be a nasty bitch.

 

[irobot sd]

Most home improvement books are going to be pretty simple and most likely residential. 2-way switch, 3-way switch, 15A breakers, washer/dryer, home-runs. Not really ideal from a growers perspective IMO. So like stated a lot has to do with your level of understanding and competence. If you aren't really sure maybe how to build out a room and it's going to take trial & error until everything is dialed in.. well there is no room for error with your electricity. So unless you want to install a ceiling fan, I say skip the book for now and search through icmag's endless pages of A+ info,ideas,layouts,wire-diagrams, etc, etc.. Get a really good idea and then it wouldn't hurt to have the gfci page opened on your handy man book to make sure you don't miss a step. Example> Get the line & load side sorted out.

 

[greenmatter]

Home Depot sells a book called Wiring 1 2 3.

like irob said there is a lot of stuff in the book that is pretty useless, but it does cover everything you will need to know for most grow rooms.

wire sizes, breakers,ohms law and some basic good habits when you are dealing with electricity are in there ...... and they are explained in a way that a novice can understand.

used bookstores rule, and it is always good to have the book in front of your face if you are not 100% confident in your abilities.

 

[LEDSmoke]

Thank you all for the info. Gonna go pick up a couple books and get the ball rolling.

 

[simpleword]

Posted this in another thread, but might as well ask in here as well:

"So the current room I'm building has a 15 amp 120v circuit on it, it also shares this circuit with the kitchen lights. I have installed 240v receptacles in the room by rerouting the cables from the central heater (right next to the room) in to the room for my lights and AC. I do not use central heat so this will not be an issue.

However, with the dehumidifier, water chiller, water pumps, air pump, and fans running it is going to be too much for the circuit. The more I think about it the more I realize I'll probably have to run a sub-panel. I can't do it from the central heater cables I'm using, as although they are on a dedicate 40amp breaker, there is no neutral running, so I can't run a 120v circuit off of it. So I'd likely have to run new cables from the breaker box to the subpanel, which is all the way across the house.

I really want to avoid this as the crawl space under my house is a shitty, black widow infested hell hole. I can't think of any other solutions though, short of running an extension cable in to the room which just isn't my style. I have installed several sub-panels before so there's no issues there, but lord I would sure love to avoid going under the house, crawling through black widows and busting out insulation to run a new cable and the costs associated with it.

Any ideas?"

 

[rives]

Unless you are lucky enough that your grow room is back-to-back with an unused stove/dryer receptacle, I don't see how you are going to avoid pulling some wire. The other (unlikely) options that comes to mind are the possibility of converting enough of your auxiliary equipment to 240v (assuming that enough of it has 120/240 as an option) that your 120v circuit would carry the remainder. Driving a 240-120 transformer would also be possible, but far more work, expense and heat generation than you would probably want to go through.

 

[razor ridge]

dont know if its been covered earlier....but could someone explain the process of setting up a controller panel...like for all controls in the grow room?

 

[rives]

I don't think that you could generalize it enough to be meaningful - lights, cooling, style of growing, etc all could impact it. For instance, I'm currently rolling my own with a micro plc, and my grow area/lighting is unique as far as I know. If you nail it down to a specific piece of equipment, or some more detail on what you are after, I might be able to help you.

 

[avant gardener]

i just had a handful of lumatek 600 watters fall into my lap.
and boy are they heavy.
problem is they're all 120v and i'm already very nearly at load capacity.
is there a safe way to convert 120v e-ballasts to 240v?
apart from not discharging the capacitor of course :/
i'm sure i'll get a better feel for it after i open one up,
but i'm also pretty sure that someone else has already tried it.

holler!

 

[rives]

AG, have you tried contacting Lumatek? I wouldn't be too surprised if they were actually compatible with the higher voltage, or possibly just need a minimal component change at the factory. It would be interesting to find out what they have to say....

 

[irobot sd]

I believe that lumateks come with a solid black rubber core housing all of their electrical components together? Did you open one up yet AG? It's pretty similar to hockey puck material. Strange some lumateks are 240v only also.. Seems they would want to bridge the gap and make 120/240 for all models.

 

[rives]

Strange some lumateks are 240v only also.. Seems they would want to bridge the gap and make 120/240 for all models.

It doesn't make sense to me that they would build/inventory different voltage models when it is so easy to make them "universal" voltage. Any bets on it being just a labeling issue?

 

[irobot sd]

I have 1 lumatek in particular. A 600w it's rating reads input 240v only. Strange thing is it's just a little bit smaller than my other lumatek models. Say the regular models are 11" x 5" (made up #'s to compare) this one is 10" x 4". Just a little more trim and sleek.