my box light burning out alot

[drewski]

I have a hydroponic setup in a box
26inch deep 4feet wide 51/2feet tall

i have a 600w hps/MH setup in this box i have a 270cfm CANN fan hooked up to this hood directly just the hood and ive burned up both of my bulbs now is this not enough air flow i only have a 4inch inline hole
120mmpc fan inside the box
4inch inline fan

the box is temp is
light on 74-79
its gets kinda cold with light off 65-70

my plants have gone threw alot of rough stages they were just starting to look healthy almost ready for budding now my HPS is burnt out and im running my flourescents now
do you have any idea why my lights would burn up so much

[Dutch Pimp]

What kind of ballast...brand?...bulbs?

Some bulbs are not compatible with certain ballasts. 600 watt seems to be the worse ones for compatiblilty.

[drewski]

heres the exact setup i bought
High Tech Garden Supply (http://htgsupply.com/viewproduct.asp?productID=48969)

[rhizome]

Umm... I think it's the cheapo bulbs...

Couple of things-

Digi ballasts are infamous for difficulty dealing with less than pristine power supplies. Don't know what your power is like, but anything at all flaky ( imperfect extension cords, blackouts, brownouts, motor surge on the circuit) will cause them to misbehave.

" Digital Greenhouse" is not a reputable name- I don't know a thing about them, but I'd wager that it's Chinese manufacture. Not exactly known for QC.

"GrowBright" bulbs seem to be exclusively marketed by HTG- Again, an unknown name, sketchy sourcing, prob Chinese manufacture...


I'm afraid that you got what you paid for...

But you could try putting a decent bulb in and see how long it lasts- Ya might get enough out of it to pay for a decent magnetic ballast from a reputable vendor, purchased locally.

Cheapo gear is like Walmart tools- Ya just end up buying them again and again, and it costs more over time than just spending the cash right up front.

Ask anybody who uses Hanna meters:D

[drewski]

Thanks for the help i thought i might of made a good decision on buying this setup i guess it wasnt as good as i thought yes i think my power shut off that the light was on it may have been that
well this sucks hopefully it wasnt my ballast i would like to get 1 grow out of this lol damn

one more question to much heat could cause them to burn out right or just unjust power to the light?

[rhizome]

Really high temps will contribute to burn-out/burn-down rates- but your temps just aren't that high, and your bulbs are still burning out way too fast...

You've checked the little circuit breaker on the ballast, right?

[drewski]

no i havent could you explain on this? what is it? lol sorry im a rookie bieotch

thanks for the quick replies and help too

[rhizome]

The Galaxies and the Lumateks ( and actually every digi I've ever seen that wasn't a raw epoxy block) have a " reset" button for the internal circuitbreaker, somewhere near the power connector.

If you have no little button, you have no circuit breaker. Looks like the reset on a power strip.

[drewski]

ok thanks im going to look into that tonight