Homemade Mini-HighBay Fixture - Inside of the Reflector
Here's the inside of the bucket reflector. I showed an E17 lamp inside to show what it will look like when I get a 35W HPS ballast (and lamp) installed in this bad boy. The socket isn't pulse rated (since it has to be of the snap-in variety, which is only made for incandescents). I'm not too worried about it though. I think a regular socket can withstand a HPS igniter pulse...
Thanks. Yeah it was a very on-the-spot thing. I saw the bucket and was like "Yeah, good fixture idea here" and went to Lowe's and poked around at what they had for boxes/enclosures. And i settled on outdoor rated round junction box extenders and and a floodlight plate for the lid of the enclosure.
This thing gets really hot with 100W incandescents after just a few minutes and after a half hour of running a 60W incandescent a mild chemical scent comes from the bucket (the paint perhaps?) so 70W PSMH is out of the question heat-wise. 35W HPS seems more appropriate for the fixture.
well as for the concern of heat....I guess the main concern there would be the Ballast & Lamp,obviously the metal pieces of the housing wont be damaged by heat but because its so compact there's not a lot of space for heat to go....perhaps one with a built in small fan is an idea?
The bucket is rather thin metal so if it gets hot enough it could be a concern. I considered punching holes around the outside of the top of the reflector for some heat vents via convection (hot air would escape through the holes and cool air would work its way up through the bottom opening of the reflector.
Yeah poke/drill some holes in the top so hear can escape...every desk lamp has that! I think maybe a 100 watt medium base MV lamp would be cool in here if it will withstand the heat.
Yeah MV would be cool but I wouldn't want to use MH because I just don't like using Mh indoors since you never know if it will explode... If I were to install my six highbays it would be in a pole barn separate from the house. I'd only use open rated lamps.
If they were 400w probe-start MH you could use MV lamps but they're not. I admittedly have an "R" lamp in an exposed situation with mine but almost never use it.
Pardon my ignorance/curiousity but is there a reason it should be the neutral and not the hot like a normal light switch? (Although I've seen light switches wired in the neutral side before by Mr. Handy Homeowner as well as lamp switches, etc.)
Yeah CMH would look nice but anything larger than the 35W HPS ballast in it won't fit. Those highbays are actually ballast-less so I could put whatever ballasts i want in. I already have a good number of 350W PSMH lamps though (well, 12, enough to relamp each fixture once) so I'll just make them 350W PSMH but I might make one 400w MH/Mv since that's what they were originally.
I'd use MH lamps on the MH/MV one so that it's brighter. In a garage I wouldn't want HID because of the warm-up and restrike time. By the time it warmed up, I wouldn't need it.
Yeah same here. If the two MV lamps I have die in my yardlight I will just use 175w probe-start MH for that exact reason, provided they'll start...I have one (a 175w GE clear Muti-Vapor) that lights fine on that HX-NPF 175w mercury ballast.
Yeah I'd have to see how long it would work before the lamp became worn out enough it would require higher OCV than the yardblaster's ballast could provide. It's decently well-used already though. It was my first HID lamp BTW
I know with the 400W MV lights they had here owned by NGrid, they used some 400W MH lamps on them and they actually did quite well. They lasted maybe even longer than a MH would on a Mh ballast! The Mv ballasts were 240V reactors that allowed for that inductive "kick" that we all hear about.
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This thing gets really hot with 100W incandescents after just a few minutes and after a half hour of running a 60W incandescent a mild chemical scent comes from the bucket (the paint perhaps?) so 70W PSMH is out of the question heat-wise. 35W HPS seems more appropriate for the fixture.