How hot should a 150w ballast get?

[Guest]

I've been test running my light for a few hours and just checked my ballast the thing is really hot, the bottom metal piece I could barely touch. I decided I should start by venting the area that the ballast is in, I also may add some more holes in the project box. But still do these things normally heat up a lot? Its way hotter than my bulb/shield are getting.

 

[Guest]

Here's an inside shot of the ballast box.. Everything inside is still super hot

 

[The Budfather]

i have a lil 100 watter and it gets real hot so im assuming a 150 should be running pretty hot also i cant even bare to touch my ballast so i wouldnt worry to much

 

[Vern Equinox]

I can't tell, is there a separate capacitor on that thing? Many 150s don't have one, and it works, but the ballast draws WAY, WAY more electricity than if you had the capacitor, around 350-375 watts! You don't pay for this extra draw, as the power company only charges for the actual watts used (maybe @ 170-190 watts), but this draw is very real as far as your components are concerned; wires, ballast, ignitor, etc. will get way hotter when there's no cap, wearing out the parts prematurely at best, and possibly causing a fire as a worse case senario (if you have multiple cheepo ballasts on the same circuit). The good thing is, you can buy a capacitor, wire it in, and increase the power factor of that thing from @ 50% where it prolly is now, up to @ 90%. (Power Factor is basically the % of electricity drawn from the wall that goes towards actually lighting the light.)

I strongly suggest you check out sugabear_II's great save from the google cache concerning PF and adding capacitors to increase the PF in cheepo lights.

Here's a link to the individual post, but there's a lot more posts on the subject, @ page 13.

http://www.icmag.com/ic/showpost.php?p=433115&postcount=189

 

[Guest]

I can't tell, is there a separate capacitor on that thing? Many 150s don't have one, and it works, but the ballast draws WAY, WAY more electricity than if you had the capacitor, around 350-375 watts! You don't pay for this extra draw, as the power company only charges for the actual watts used (maybe @ 170-190 watts), but this draw is very real as far as your components are concerned; wires, ballast, ignitor, etc. will get way hotter when there's no cap, wearing out the parts prematurely at best, and possibly causing a fire as a worse case senario (if you have multiple cheepo ballasts on the same circuit). The good thing is, you can buy a capacitor, wire it in, and increase the power factor of that thing from @ 50% where it prolly is now, up to @ 90%. (Power Factor is basically the % of electricity drawn from the wall that goes towards actually lighting the light.)

I strongly suggest you check out sugabear_II's great save from the google cache concerning PF and adding capacitors to increase the PF in cheepo lights.

Here's a link to the individual post, but there's a lot more posts on the subject, @ page 13.

http://www.icmag.com/ic/showpost.php?p=433115&postcount=189

You rock my socks man, thanks for the info!