ballast life accuracy?

[stage20]

all these t5 t8 t12 threads are making my head spin. buy a cheap fixture and have radio interference, buy a cheap fixture and have to replace ballasts when you change your air filter.

even the "quality" units at the supply house are rated for commerical.

ive found some really clean looking(although cheap china) fixutres with residental ballasts, but only have a 10,000 hour life.

a cheap strip light ballast lists a 50,000 hour life.

10,000 hours is only 416 days if i left the lights on. 24/7

 

[rockwithjason]

what's your question?

 

[Kevin C]

all these t5 t8 t12 threads are making my head spin. buy a cheap fixture and have radio interference, buy a cheap fixture and have to replace ballasts when you change your air filter.

even the "quality" units at the supply house are rated for commercial.

I have found some really clean looking(although cheap china) fixtures with residential ballasts, but only have a 10,000 hour life.

a cheap strip light ballast lists a 50,000 hour life.

10,000 hours is only 416 days if i left the lights on. 24/7

The Phillips consumer units are rated at 160,624 hours... The commercial units are less at around 75,000 hours (power factor correction circuit has caps that shorten its life).

Philips Advance fluorescent electronic and magnetic ballasts are
designed and manufactured to engineering standards correlating to
an average life expectancy of 50,000 hours of operation at maximum
rated case temperature. Since Philips Advance ballasts operate below
their maximum case temperature in the majority of applications,
increased ballast life can be expected. As a rule of thumb, ballast
life may be doubled for every 10°C reduction in ballast case
operating temperature. However, there are many variables,
such as input voltage, ambient temperature, etc. which affect
ballast operating temperatures, and therefore ballast life.

Like everything... they work better if they run cooler. There are a some low cost consumer grade ballasts with a 10,000 hour rating (Espen Technology and Jiangmen ). The average rated life for ballasts is about 45,500 hours (210 ballasts that are listed on the energy star website).

Since most ballast are not going to be running at max case temp, the actual life expectancy should be significantly better.

 

[stage20]

what's your question?

Kevin answered it in his last. Sentance. Thanks

 

[stage20]

went to the local supply house and told him i wanted a quality residential grade light and said all he carries is commerical strip lights and they will be fine. went back and forth trying to explain i wanted to listen to a radio and he said he has never heard of any light making a radio go to static. asked another guy at the counter and he said if youve got static youve got an electrical issue, its not the light. i tried to beat it into them, but they were stubborn and wouldnt listen. so i asked what he wanted for a wrap around light (residential ballast) and he came back with 54 bucks.

 

[ForceFed70]

went to the local supply house and told him i wanted a quality residential grade light and said all he carries is commerical strip lights and they will be fine. went back and forth trying to explain i wanted to listen to a radio and he said he has never heard of any light making a radio go to static. asked another guy at the counter and he said if youve got static youve got an electrical issue, its not the light. i tried to beat it into them, but they were stubborn and wouldnt listen. so i asked what he wanted for a wrap around light (residential ballast) and he came back with 54 bucks.

I've got 9 x 4' 4lamp commercial T8 fixtures in my garage and not a hint of noise in my radio signal. He's probably right about it being fine. Commercial does not automatically mean it emits a bunch of EMI.

 

[stage20]

ive done a lot of searching and out of my own experience with different friends over the years, lights always seem to cause issues. there are several threads on here that pretty much state any light from lowes or home depot is going to hinder your radio.

the more i read the more confused i am.

 

[darcyh]

I am taking an educated guess here; electronic ballasts are essentially switching power supplies with all kinds of funky things going on inside. Eventually a capacitor shorts or leaks sufficiently causing failure of the related components inside the ballast.

I believe heat (and to some extent age) eventually causes the caps to fail and there goes the ballast. Five to 15 years would be my expectation for normal life of a unit.

Regards
Dave