Digital Ballasts and Power Outages

I have a 400watt Lumatek digital ballast (120V). I've seen people complain about power outages causing problems with air pumps and water pumps etc etc.

What happens during an unattended power outage with a digital ballast?

I only ask, cause I turned mine on for awhile, then turned it off to move it. Few minutes later plugged it back in and nothing happened. I turned it back off, waited. Did some snooping on the lumatek site and it says to wait 20-30 minutes after turning it off (power outage I assume would be included), before turning it back on.

Will it wait till it is ready or time, then turn back on? I don't want to fake one to find out.

The bulb is too hot to restrike. Thats what the cooling off period is for. When the power goes out, then back on quickly, chances are you bulb will just glow a lil bit, you'll see a flicker inside as its trying to restrike.

This DRAMATICALLY shortens bulb life. Your best bet is to do as the instructions say, keep it off 15-20 minutes.

What about UNATTENDED power outages? Will it just eventually come back on by itself? Freaky things can happen on the way to the grocery store :/

I have frequent power outages and fluctuations here, so I run my ballast thru a 'surge-suppressor power strip', just like my computer and TVs, etc. ... the protection level of these strips is pretty 'iffy', but cheap ... :smokin:

If you are very worried about it and have $50-100 to spare, go get a UPS. Make sure you take into account the 400w size when you pick one out (the bigger the unit, the longer it will power your light). You should be able to get somewhere between a half hour to an hour out of one.

These devices are also very nice for air pumps in DWC setups.

I have APC UPS 900 which does 540 Watts. it is for my servers though. I believe it was $109 at compusa. I i was just hoping to figure out what happens during an unattended outage, without having to fake it :)

I have unplugged and replugged in my 1K's and 400 several times, foolishly that is, but 10 months later I am still getting the same results from them. I am about to change them out none the less. I have both digital and magnetic. One time I did have a scare though, my 1K came unplugged and I plugged it back in real quick and the bulb sounded like it was boiling and bubbling inside, I did unplug it then and wait about 1/2 hour. That was over 8 months ago and I still am using the bulb.
Adieu

I've got 4 600 watt HPS Future Brite ballast and they say to wait that long as well. Also has a fuse.If it don't strike after the second try then it will wait the 20 min. before trying again.Thank God,for technology!

Ga Grown!