Ballast question

[phoenix5x]

He all,

Upgrading the lighting in my new garage and have come across something interesting. I am replacing some 400w and 175 watt merc vapor lighting fixtures that use the large mogul bases with 6 bulb fluorescent fixtures. These fixtures are lithonia IB 632. I borrowed a couple older ones of these to see if the would light the area well enough for me to work...the ones I borrowed are older and have 2 white wires, 2 black wires and the green. Not too much of a riddle which wires go where...but when I turned the 1st one on to make sure it works the other mogul base fixtures in the series make a much louder high pitched noise than the typical hum when they are powered on also they cause enough interference to actually cause static on my FM radio about 20 ft away. Could this be bad ballasts in the borrowed fixtures or possible issues with mis-matched ballasts between the lithonia's and the mogul base fixtures?

 

[kd3pc]

difference between old and new ballasts and residential vs commercial ballast.

Your local electrical supply house can decifer the ballast you have and then point you towards quiet ones that will work for your upgrade.

 

[phoenix5x]

Well I am saying that the lights that have been installed in the garage before now make make noise that they did not before..currently I have 1 of the lithonia and 3 of the existing light wired in series together and I get noise from the existing ballasts that i didn't before and they now cause inter Terence on a radio..should any ballast type commercial or residential cause that type of interference?

 

[phoenix5x]

I went ahead and added 2 more today and now there is only one mobile base fixture left and the ballast noise has almost disappeared.. Didn't think different ballasts would cause that much issue...the interference has also dissipated

 

[cybrdyke]

Lithonia doesn't consider the IB632 to be a residential luminaire, so they wouldn't have used residential ballasts in it. The commercial ballasts can cause the issues you are having, although I haven't heard of fixtures changing notes before. That's kinda funny.
Anyway, the ballasts in the IB632 are probably high lumen ballasts with a ballast factor of 1.18 -ish. Most likely there will be 2 of them, each running 3 lamps. I am doubtful you will find these in a residential version, so the radio issue will probably remain if you were to proceed on with your upgrade.
You have an option to find a residential ballast in the 3 lamp configuration with a normal ballast factor and swap them in. This will not only cost you some extra money to find and install them, but it will also lose you about 1000 lumens per tube.
Another option is to re-think the radio situation. Wireless or internet radio seems to be popular. With the money you save by switching from 400w MV to 220w T8, you could buy something pretty cool....
Good luck
CD

 

[phoenix5x]

Thank for that info I am fine with the commercial portion of them and yeah they put 1.15 in ballast factor, but the mis-match in ballast seemed to be my biggest issue with the interference. I now have 3 of the ib 632 and 1 of the mogul base fixtures and the interference is almost gone. The last mogul base fixture still has a weird sound to it when it powers on. This was a weird phenomenon it would be interesting if someone could replicate but I just know I have to replace the entire line of lights at a time instead of individually. eventually yeah I think wireless radio is on the menu I already have xm in the car could pay extra to get it to another receiver...thanx a bunch

 

[fmeisenheimer]

I'm replacing my burned out magnetic ballasts with electric. I read somewhere that I can not run a mix of mag/elec on the same circuit. What's the deal?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[phoenix5x]

I am guessing that was where my problem lied...I ended up replacing all the lights in the circuit and everything is quiet as can be...not sure i can explain the reasoning behind it maybe someoneon here can...