ive been wondering how to go about acquiring a nice 175 watt mercury vapor cobrahead for my collection but on the cheap.... any advice??

Well unless your good at climbing poles in the dark and working on live wiring, you might try visiting a local Re-Store and see what they have, they do show up from time to time, put an ISO on Kijiji/Craigslist, phone your city/county, state ask for there surplus sales and give them a call or visit there website/store. Keep an eye on ebay, or make your own from a HPS/MH model, just swap out the gear..   

Where are you located? I have a 175w MV cobrahead that I am currently refurbishing and when it is done I might be interested in selling it. It would be around $30 plus whatever shipping costs, which shouldn't be too much since it doesn't actually weigh that much. Otherwise, if you get an HPS cobrahead, you can get a cheap 175w mercury vapor ballast here.

https://www.1000bulbs.com/product/89417/PLUSRITE-7210.html

Also, check your local Craigslist frequently. With the amount of LED replacements going on, cobraheads are getting a lot easier to get. They also turn up on eBay quite often and every so often (around this time of the year) they show up for pretty cheap.

im up in Maryland, i never knew that restore sells cobra heads at all... ill be sure to watch ebay and check in with restore like a hawk lol

Ok the Re-Store by me, I've seen it all, from explosion proof fixtures, highbay, lowbay, floodlights, spotlights, street lighting, crates of ballasts, I visited once and they literately had about a 1000 HID light bulbs, it all kinda depends on the day, about the only things I've never seen there is LPS gear/fixtures but I did score a few LPS tubes, I basically go there every weekend to see if they have anything that's new...

I get my cobra heads dirt cheap, al u have to do is find a metal recycling yard that let u buy scrap metal for reuse projects, i can get them for less than 5 bucks
And some times i can save lamps and PC and also street light arms as well.  Scrap yard should be happy  to  sell it to ya as they know they can make little bit more
Money off of ya .  Best time to go is when scrap yard is not busy.  Me best time to go is noon as u have about 1 hour to look around while they go for lunch.

i know of a bunch of scrapyards near me ill try that as ive seen a bunch of cool stuff in the scrapyard

ive been wondering how to go about acquiring a nice 175 watt mercury vapor cobrahead for my collection but on the cheap.... any advice??

I've found them at St. Vincent DePaul thrift stores, Goodwill thrift stores, mom and pop thrift, surplus and salvage stores. Here in Seattle, there was a store called Pacific industrial Supply down on 4th Ave S. They had all kinds of HID surplus, lamps, and fixtures. Unfortunately, they lost their lease and had to move. They just scrapped the surplus and opened a shiny new store a few miles away. Needless to say, the new location is not anywhere close to the old glory days.

A couple of places here in Seattle that cater to vintage building lighting and electrical, is Second Use, and Earth Wise. (These places can be expensive but can have some real gems...they're also run by hippies...ugh.) You may have something simular in your local hometown.

Here's some links:
http://seconduse.com/inventory/categories/electrical/electrical-lightfixtures/
http://ewsalvage.com/

I've found them at St. Vincent DePaul thrift stores, Goodwill thrift stores, mom and pop thrift, surplus and salvage stores. Here in Seattle, there was a store called Pacific industrial Supply down on 4th Ave S. They had all kinds of HID surplus, lamps, and fixtures. Unfortunately, they lost their lease and had to move. They just scrapped the surplus and opened a shiny new store a few miles away. Needless to say, the new location is not anywhere close to the old glory days.

A couple of places here in Seattle that cater to vintage building lighting and electrical, is Second Use, and Earth Wise. (These places can be expensive but can have some real gems...they're also run by hippies...ugh.) You may have something simular in your local hometown.

Here's some links:
http://seconduse.com/inventory/categories/electrical/electrical-lightfixtures/
http://ewsalvage.com/

LOL the few hippies I've met seemed to be fun people....

Ok the Re-Store by me, I've seen it all, from explosion proof fixtures, highbay, lowbay, floodlights, spotlights, street lighting, crates of ballasts, I visited once and they literately had about a 1000 HID light bulbs, it all kinda depends on the day, about the only things I've never seen there is LPS gear/fixtures but I did score a few LPS tubes, I basically go there every weekend to see if they have anything that's new...

One lucky duck for sure!

I've got 5 restores near me and they all stink. They have some interesting flouro here and there, but not much HID and I haven't seen any industrial lighting at all at any of them. That is unless the marietta store has something I've missed at all the others as I haven't been to that one yet.

One lucky duck for sure!

I've got 5 restores near me and they all stink. They have some interesting flouro here and there, but not much HID and I haven't seen any industrial lighting at all at any of them. That is unless the marietta store has something I've missed at all the others as I haven't been to that one yet.

We have huge energy efficiency rebates from the government right now, LED's are below the cost of manufacture, so everyone is swapping them out before they pull the rebates, and the fixtures have to disposed of, there is no keeping them and Re-store takes them for free and offers a tax deductible receipt, so the rebate gets even bigger come tax time, and the residential rebate only lasted like a month and it was gone, stores couldn't keep LED's on the shelves, the guy in the lighting area at Lowes wasn't able to stock them fast enough, he just started tossing entire boxes on the floor.. (I changed all the lights in the kids house to help out with there power bill for about $15 usd)

And to make Rick happy, I watched him drop a master pack with like 400 bulbs in from about 20 feet onto the concrete floor, needless to say those all glass LED ribbon bulbs didn't look the same in that box...   

I too would love to find a MV cobrahead (or a MH would be cool too - maybe even better because could put a colored lamp in it!)


I once (years ago) saw a hew HPS cobrahead at a ReStore .. price was way too high for me, but if I remember right one of the guys on the GOL site went over & bought it after I mentioned it being there

Anymore the ReStores pretty much suck for lighting (ever since they stopped accepting used fluorescent lamp/fixture donations), its mostly crap like ceiling fans & common incandescent fixtures. Now & then something HID will show up & occasionally new fluorescents.

I too would love to find a MV cobrahead (or a MH would be cool too - maybe even better because could put a colored lamp in it!)


I once (years ago) saw a hew HPS cobrahead at a ReStore .. price was way too high for me, but if I remember right one of the guys on the GOL site went over & bought it after I mentioned it being there

Anymore the ReStores pretty much suck for lighting (ever since they stopped accepting used fluorescent lamp/fixture donations), its mostly crap like ceiling fans & common incandescent fixtures. Now & then something HID will show up & occasionally new fluorescents.

When did they stop accepting fluorescents? My restore won't take shoplights but they will take troffers and striplights.

When did they stop accepting fluorescents? My restore won't take shoplights but they will take troffers and striplights.

Its been a number of years now...
But my post should have read "the ReStores here pretty much suck for lighting (ever since they stopped accepting used fluorescent" .lol. Since what they accept varies by region and/or store
The group of stores in my region quit taking fluorescents (with the exception of new from companies), but  other places they still do, its not a corporate-wide thing as to what is/is-not accepted...