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My girlfriends grandad owns a junkyard and has some old mercury vapor lamps that he doesnt use anymore, I grabbed one just so I ddin't have to go back there, but does anyone know if it will work with a metal halide bulb? I know the MH bulb needs a pulse I didnt know if this would work.
Any help?
Mercury vapor bulbs are not suitable for growing. You need MH or HPS.
...mercury vapor ballast?..with a MH bulb?...I don't know..not likely.
man, it took me all of 5 seconds to find this on google.
"In order for a lamp to work as designed, three things need to be in place. First, the base of the lamp must fit the socket. Next, sockets for discharge lamps (i.e., fluorescent, high pressure sodium, mercury vapor, metal halide, and low pressure sodium) must connect to a ballast. Last, the ballast must be of the correct type to run that particular lamp."
Metal halide lamps have an operating voltage close to that of mercury lamps in many wattages, but have stricter tolerances for wattage and current waveform. Metal halides also usually need a higher starting voltage. Most metal halide lamps 100 watts or smaller require a high voltage starting pulse around or even over 1,000 volts.
"175 to 400 watt metal halide lamp ballasts can power mercury lamps of the same wattage, but the reverse is not recommended. Mercury lamps 50 to 100 watts will work on metal halide ballasts, but hot restriking of mercury lamps 100 watts or smaller on metal halide lamps may be hard on the mercury lamp since the starting pulse can force current through cold electrodes and the starting resistor inside the mercury lamp."
thanks for playing.
-shake