Ballast Failures/Explosions or anything happening to the aux gear for lighting « on: May 23, 2018, 06:52:57 AM » Author: F96T12 DD VHO
This goes for any auxiliary gear, chargers, lamps, and transformers I have a lot of stories where a ballast or transformer had and explosion or a catastrophe that I wil post throughout the thread. Here is one about a transformer My 240V transformer got really hot (189 deg F) and tripped the breaker, I was trying to run a 230V 1000W lamp that my girlfriend got from Iceland, I don’t know what happened but I’m not going to use it again until I know what’s going on This has to do with lighting because sometimes the lights like to make auxiliary gear fail and sometimes the gear makes the light kill itself I would like to hear some of your stories about this topic if you wish to share
« Last Edit: May 23, 2018, 07:07:58 AM by F96T12 DD VHO »		Logged

Music Producer/Light Enthusiast

	Re: Ballast Failures/Explosions or anything happening to the aux gear for lighting « Reply #1 on: May 23, 2018, 08:08:17 AM » Author: dor123
https://www.lighting-gallery.net/gallery/displayimage.php?pos=-142986
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I"m don't speak English well, and rely on online translating to write in this site.
Please forgive me if my choice of my words looks like offensive, while that isn't my intention.

I only working with the international date format (dd.mm.yyyy).

I lives in Israel, which is a 220-240V, 50hz country.

	Re: Ballast Failures/Explosions or anything happening to the aux gear for lighting « Reply #2 on: May 29, 2018, 05:09:16 AM » Author: suzukir122
I've had numerous electronic ballasts, specifically with CFL lamps, explode in the past. (Either the ballast, or maybe the capacitor(s)). One time I bought a Lights Of America 42watt self ballasted CFL. (quad U-Tube type lamp) I remember this lamp definitely being programmed start. Thing is, this lamp would slowly fire up. I was entertained by this. So, as a kid, I flipped the switch on and off... and on and off. Finally, I resorted to flipping on and off the switch to the point where only the start up would occur without the lamp successfully firing up. Short, quick flipping of the switch over and over again. Stupid move. After a while of doing this, there was a loud electrical bang from the base of the lamp, followed by smoke. Either the ballast, or maybe something else inside the lamp, exploded. Scared the crap out of me. This is only one of the many stories I have of exploding electronic ballasts/gearing. Quick note: all of my situations occurred only with electronic ballasts, not magnetic ballasts.
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Interests:
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2. Weightlifting/staying extremely athletic
3. Severe Thunderstorms of all kinds
4. Food and drinks. So gimme them bbq ribs
Lighting has ALWAYS been a passion of mine. I consider everyone on here to be a friend

	Re: Ballast Failures/Explosions or anything happening to the aux gear for lighting « Reply #4 on: May 29, 2018, 10:25:00 AM » Author: suzukir122
Whenever a CFL starts randomly flickering, I always make sure to check the ends for any potential EOL confirmation. Here's another quick story... I had a "Bright Effects" CFL, which seemed to be Resonant Start. The CFL went EOL, and I had the end that was severely blackened, facing my direction so that I could see it. It was 13 watts, and it lit the closet of my room at the time. (This was a long time ago.) The blackened end turned purple and the light got dim from time to time. Then after a while the blackened end turned violent orange and the light was flickering crazily during this time. That's when an electrical pop came from the ballast, and the light shut off. Again... scared the crap out of me. I unscrewed the light and ended up smelling smoke. Took me a while, but when I held the lamp to a light, I could see the smoke rising from the lamp.
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Interests:
1. Motorcycles, Cars, Women, and Lighting (especially fluorescent)
2. Weightlifting/staying extremely athletic
3. Severe Thunderstorms of all kinds
4. Food and drinks. So gimme them bbq ribs
Lighting has ALWAYS been a passion of mine. I consider everyone on here to be a friend

	Re: Ballast Failures/Explosions or anything happening to the aux gear for lighting « Reply #5 on: May 29, 2018, 11:30:23 AM » Author: dor123
When electronically ballasted CFL flickering, the problem is the ballast electronics and not the electrodes being reached EOL.
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I"m don't speak English well, and rely on online translating to write in this site.
Please forgive me if my choice of my words looks like offensive, while that isn't my intention.

I only working with the international date format (dd.mm.yyyy).

I lives in Israel, which is a 220-240V, 50hz country.

	Re: Ballast Failures/Explosions or anything happening to the aux gear for lighting « Reply #6 on: May 29, 2018, 01:10:18 PM » Author: Medved
Quote from: dor123 on May 29, 2018, 11:30:23 AM When electronically ballasted CFL flickering, the problem is the ballast electronics and not the electrodes being reached EOL. When there is a doubler rectifier (some 120V models), it may start to flicker. Then the arc root dancing on the worn out cathode may cause the lamp flicker too, as the arc is moving within the tube. But both of these are rather low frequency flicker - less than the mains frequency (5..20Hz). If the flicker is double of the mains frequency, most likely it is indeed the ballast itself. But with CFLs the cause uses to be the lamp reaching EOL causing high load on the ballast components, some of which then fail.
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No more selfballasted c***

	Re: Ballast Failures/Explosions or anything happening to the aux gear for lighting « Reply #8 on: May 29, 2018, 07:48:08 PM » Author: suzukir122
In my case the flickering was actually more like occasional blinking with almost all of the violent EOL's I've seen with CFL's. But with each violent EOL, it always ended with an electrical component exploding within the lamp base. I should correct myself though, it was more like blinking, not necessarily flickering.
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Interests:
1. Motorcycles, Cars, Women, and Lighting (especially fluorescent)
2. Weightlifting/staying extremely athletic
3. Severe Thunderstorms of all kinds
4. Food and drinks. So gimme them bbq ribs
Lighting has ALWAYS been a passion of mine. I consider everyone on here to be a friend

	Re: Ballast Failures/Explosions or anything happening to the aux gear for lighting « Reply #9 on: May 29, 2018, 10:48:32 PM » Author: wide-lite 1000
Years ago we had a 400w mh hibay start occasionally flickering, assumed it was a bulb going bad and thought nothing of it WELL, the next day we were just minding our own business, working away and all of the sudden, loud ZAAAAAP! and out went the light with a bunch of sparks and a big black mark on the ceiling (yes it tripped the breaker!) When maintence took it apart the ballast looked like someone took a torch to the coils
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