Metal halide tripping breaker, help

[jdavid]

I have a luxcore select-a-watt ballast and a lumen right mini pendant (both coralvue products) and what was a brand new 400w radium.

I just tried to fire it for the first time and it immediately tripped the breaker.

The cord from the ballast to the pendant comes stripped and I had to use wire nuts on the three wires (black, white, green). Now I'm no rocket scientist but I assume that you match the colors lol.

Upon plugging in the power supply the bulb attempted to fire for about 1 second then the breaker flipped. Unplugged everything else in the room, waited for it to cool down, same thing happened.

The lamp now looks greyish-black.. I'm assuming this is normal after firing twice??

Is the problem where I connected the wires??

Edit: I have unplugged the ballast from the pendant and left the ballast plugged in (there is no on/off switch on the ballast)

Now the breaker is not flipping.

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[falos]

Maybe a bad bulb or ballast then again you could be pulling to much power find a outlet closest to the braker and try there

 

[ralph atl]

I'm guessing too much load on that one breaker (most likely 15 amp), as you probably have other "stuff" plugged in that same circuit.

or bad (short) ballast.

plug it in another circuit, say kitchen and see what happens....

 

[freezerrat]

mysterybox;917983 wrote: plug it in another circuit, say kitchen and see what happens....

+1
Try it on a 20 amp circuit.

 

[jdavid]

I ran an extension cord to the bathroom, but I also went to Walmart and picked up some screw on wire nuts. It's working now, but I haven't tried plugging it up in here yet. Sure would suck if it doesn't work in this room, I did try unplugging everything else before.

Either way, it's working now, an my clam is pissed so I got a raise it up a bit. I've got a long piece of conduit supported by pipe holder brackets directly into the stud, then there's a 90 elbow and a shorter piece of conduit that the fixture is attached to. Just gonna stack 2x4 pieces under the pole and remove 1 a day.

 

[cosigner]

Just a friendly tip...

If you plan on leaving the wire nuts on, unplug the light, remove the wire nuts, fill them with RTV silicon, carefully reinsert the wires as they were and tighten them down. Allow the RTV to vulcanize and wrap the whole splice with rubber electrical tape thoroughly and then electrical tape. Now it's completely water proof at the splice.

Edit: Just a friendly tip...

If you plan on leaving the wire nuts on, unplug the light, remove the wire nuts, fill them with RTV silicon, carefully reinsert the wires as they were and tighten them down. Allow the RTV to vulcanize and wrap the whole splice with rubber electrical tape thoroughly and then electrical tape. Now it's completely water proof at the splice.

 

[brick fish house]

Maybe get more power run to the room? One or. Two dedicated lines for your system?

 

[cosigner]

^ +1

Edit: Ugh, my phone is retarded. You should wrap with electrical tape, and then the rubber tape.

 

[acroholic]

Yup, dedicated circuits are the way to go. It is hard to use regular household plugs if you run anything else on the circuit, particularly with metal halide lighting. Plug in a vacuum cleaner and you'll see what I mean. I have two dedicated circuits for my LED lit 100 reef, not too bad. But I have 5 (so far) on my 465 reef, and that is with 4x 400 watt halides and 6x 110 watt VHOs.

I had an electrician do a subpanel for the 465, and had three new circuits added to the main panel just for tanks.

If you don't have a lot of other load on that circuit, then check your breaker connections and your outlet wiring for the issue. If you don't know your way around a breaker panel, then get an electrician to do it for you. Safety first, of course. It is possible it could also be in the ballast or the reflector.

 

[jdavid]

The only solution to this issue would be to hire an electrician, if I could even get permission to do so in the first place. The last thing I'm going to do is DIY.

It's not my house. I've already calculated about what the light would cost to run just to pay for that, which was well recieved, so maybe it is an option to bring in a professional.

Or, my dad might do it. His dad was an electrician and I think he has done some similar work on the house.

Edit: The only solution to this issue would be to hire an electrician, if I could even get permission to do so in the first place. The last thing I'm going to do is DIY.

It's not my house. I've already calculated about what the light would cost to run just to pay for that, which was well recieved, so maybe it is an option to bring in a professional.

Or, my dad might do it. His dad was an electrician and I think he has done some similar work on the house.

Edit: Actually, there is a solution. When we moved here, what is now my two rooms was one big room. My dad built a dividing wall, so that one room would be his office and the other would be for me and my brother to play in.

When he built that wall my grandfather (electrician) installed an outlet on either side of the wall, on their own 20 amp breaker with GFCI.

So that's my dedicated outlet for the MH and I should be fine.