power box dpc 7500

[cheech]

one thing i notice about the cap 8x is that they want you to wire it to a 40 amp breaker. 8 1000 watt ballasts is like 38 amps, so that's over the 80% breaker capacity rule.

 

[mrdizzle]

The CAP ones that have the breakers build in that look like a DIY are good, the plastic ones like I rock suck as far as quality go. I have used them for 3plus years thou

I thought those powerboxes were actually goiing to be the shit, but I read they are cheapy made ect. you cant win sometimes

 

[mc1969]

i do not but know many people who do . i switched to green air and could not be happier

 

[cheech]

that's fine i'll post the inside of how it looks. i'm not going to worry about $300. and thanks for posting that green air timer.. i haven't ever ran across those. i'll have to check them out in case the powerbox is junk.

i do know i ran across a thread regarding the powerbox flip and there was a powerbox employee posting in it. one of the members mentioned that he had seen a thread that said the powerbox was cheaply made with black electrical tape around the wires, and the dude working for powerbox said that was not true... if mc says it is i don't have any reason not to believe him.... it will be interesting to see if they got their shit together though.

 

[mc1969]

will find the pics i took of the inside of mine and remember they have little stickers over the screw holes that if disturbed voids the warrenty ..:wondering

 

[DeRail]

spend the money and buy a good unit .these things are cheap cuss they build them cheap

I just installed one of these for a grower/breeder they are very nice units in fact i recommended this unit to him.
I have used many CAP products currently using a
XGC-1E and it controls my whole room all 2X4 foot hydro hut LOL I know it is over kill but i am buying a house soon and hope to expand.

 

[cymbaline]

that timer on the green air box looks like the 6$ cheapy I bought at lowes a month ago.

 

[cheech]

well i got the power box, tried to open it up. they must have glued one side of it down because there's a sticker next to that side that says opening the powerbox voids the warranty. i can peek in though, and although i was in dim light i didn't see any electrical tape.

i'm sure it will work fine... pretty hard to fuck up the wiring on a double pole single throw relay. i did the smallest amount of research and found just how easy it is to wire these up with a relay... i feel kind of stupid for buying this since i already familiarized myself with relays when i built my flip flops.

i'm sure powerbox doesn't want the unit to be opened because then you would know just how easy it was to duplicate it for less then $100.

i'll post back in this thread if i have any problems with it.

in the future however i'll build a diy light controller exactly like the one in that link.

 

[cheech]

just looked above at mc's post.. it must be the sticker covering up the last screw hole... hah. good idea on their part though.

 

[Olyver]

I'd be leery of any manufacture that prevented me from looking inside. What if you don't want to junction the 6 foot cord and want to hardwire the Powerbox to the panel. It actually looks like a few of the Powerbox units don't have big enough wire going into them. I remember when cap had tamper stickers that said "void" if you opened the MLC-8 and MLC-4. How do you expect to wire power to the unit if you can't oen it up. Others have told me that Powerbox is crap

 

[Midnight_son]

A lot of manufactures dont want you to take stuff apart, Especially electrical/electronics. When you order one of those you can specify plug & play or hardwire. The 6 foot cord I guess one has to live with it.

 

[cheech]

correct. this company couldn't possibly fuck up a few 240 volt receptacles wired to a relay.

my only complaint is that the 240 volt outlets are straight up 240 volt outlets, and do not allow sun system 'smart cords'. all my sun system cords are set up so you can swap the female end of the cord from 120 to 240 on the ballast allowing the male end which still looks like a 120 cord to be plugged into 240 volt power. cap timers allow for this option. i had to spend $40 on new ballast plugs.

i'm still trying to set the digital timer also.. i think i have it figured out.

 

[Lost]

The only thing good about the cap's are the x-plugs..

 

[cheech]

little update on the powerbox.. yesterday i saw that the 30 amp female plug that the powerbox male end was plugged into was melting. i went to home depot and tried to find another female end that was rated at 40 amps but there were none.

i'm going to do some web browsing and see if i can find a 40 amp plug that matches up with the male end of the powerbox, but i have a feeling i'm not going to find one.... if that is the case then shame on powerbox for wiring there 40 amp unit to a male end plug that can only be plugged into a socket rated at 30 amps.... at least the powerbox cord is 8 amp.

i replaced the 30 amp male end with a 40/50 amp male end so i could plug it into the new 40/50 amp female plug i bought.

the 40/50 amp female plug i bought looks exactly like the 30 amp female plug except the it has 3 straight metal pieces and one U shaped piece.. the 30 amp had 2 straight metal pieces a u shaped and a L shaped.

anyone know what makes a plug 30 or 50 amps??? it's not like there's any wire.. just metal that allows electricity to transfer from one wire to another. maybe the 50 amp peaces of the plug are slightly larger then the 30 amp, but if they were i couldn't tell.

 

[vapedg13]

i got one of these power boxes how you guys hooking up the 3 wire hardwire to the pannel? We are using a 30 amp 2 pole breaker.

I was told by the powerbox people for a 240 v connection that white wsire is to the common bar ....the other 2 wires are power (110 from each side of the pole) no ground.

we hooked it up this way ..the timer workd as soon as we touched the box we got shocked all to hell

White to common ...green black power....is how the Power box emailed for installation

correct - white to common. check all of the connections all the way along the line - needless to say, you should not be getting shocked. something must be wrong somewhere.

I think it should be green ground.... white black power??

Why wouldnt there be a ground??

 

[Olyver]

Powerbox units are crap. If the unit has 120V outlets as well, it should have 4 wires, black, red, white, and green. If it only has 3 wires, black, white, and green, then you're right. Black and white are the two 120V connections from the breaker and green is ground/bond. If there is a trigger cable, they probably use the ground from the trigger cable to bond the receptacles to ground. I still don't get why people buy crap, just cause it looks nice. That's what get from something manufactured by a real estate agent, not a qualified electrician.

 

[Swerve]

olyver 120v is only black,white and green one hot one neutral and one ground. 240v is red, black, white, green 2 hots a ground and a neutral..

 

[Olyver]

You're explaining 120v and 240v to me, I don't think so. I'm a licensed electrician. If you read my post correctly, 240V can be white and black and the green is ground bond. For 240V you don't use the white for neutral, it's used for 120v. The dpc 7500 is wired for 6 x 240V outlets, so the manufacturer used on 3 conductor SO wire, which would only have black, white, and green.

 

[Swerve]

cool sorry for popping in man.. dam

 

[Olyver]

Sorry for sounding rude, I just want people/growers to have the best equipment. I've been building for years and never a complaint and seen alot of faulty and poorly built lighting controllers.

Best Regards

Olyver