Replacing ballasts - scrape paint for ground?

[Teikas Dad]

I installed my new Lithonia T8 strip lights and they made all kinds of static when I turned them on. Contacted Accupro (ballast supplied with lights) and they sent out 6 new ballasts which arrived today. My question is in regards to grounding. I have the ground wire for the electric grounded to the green screw on the light strip so the metal chassis for the lights is grounded. Should I scrape some paint off the ballast where the screw holds it to the strip to give the ballast a good ground, or is that something I don't have to worry about?

Part II - Something else I just thought of. Do you pull the wires out of the bulb sockets and rewire the ballast there or just use wire nuts and connecticut to the wires that were originally installed on the sockets? If using wire nuts, should I shorten all wires as much as possible or doesn't it make any difference?

 

[MrMark]

Scraping the paint off would be a great idea in most grounding situations to achieve better contact, but in this case the screw is tapped (at least it should be) and the tapped threads making solid metal to metal contact are responsible for the positive grounding.

 

[Teikas Dad]

Scraping the paint off would be a great idea in most grounding situations to achieve better contact, but in this case the screw is tapped (at least it should be) and the tapped threads making solid metal to metal contact are responsible for the positive grounding.

The screw goes into the metal chassis of the light, but it goes through a painted slot in the ballast, so it doesn't touch any bare metal on the ballast. That's what I'm trying to figure out, should I scrape the paint so that I do have contact between the screw and ballast - or - is the ballast supposed to be isolated from the ground and that's why it's painted.

 

[MrMark]

No on the isolation. How many wires coming out of the ballast? The paint would not be used as an isolation method anyway, it's not effective enough for that. It is merely effective enough to cause trouble on a ground.

 

[Aceman]

I'd leave it alone, the manufacturers would of left the surface unpainted if they thought there was a reason to do so.

 

[Torque1st]

Star washers are your friend.

 

[Teikas Dad]

The ballast has 1 black wire, 1 white wire, 2 yellow wires, 2 blue wires and 2 red wires. Black & white is power and neutral. Yellows go to the outboard end sockets; red and blue go to the two inboard sockets. There's no green ground wire.

 

[66HertzClone]

Star washers are your friend.

X2 Easy to do and work great.

 

[Teikas Dad]

Hmmmmm, for some reason I think that star washers might be a good idea....

Now - what say ye about trimming the wires...go or no go?

 

[Charles (in GA)]

Scrape it and be done, it cannot hurt. Light fixtures and ballasts have so much paint on them, I always scrape the paint, usually my ground screw is a separate screw into the white fixture housing.

Charles

 

[Rudyjr]

I always cut the wires and use wire nuts when replacing ballasts. The connections on the lamp sockets are too hard to disconnect without damaging IMO.