Best Brand of Digital Ballast?

[Darth Fader]

Thx farmers - scored a barely used Quantum 600 for $150! Waiting on a Digilux HPS bulb & gonna blow it up next rd!

 

[tomsawyer]

Hey Farmers! A friend gave me a Global Greenhouse 400 ballast and i was wondering what you guys have heard about them. My friend never used it and i honestly havent heard anything about them at all. Any help is much appreciated, thanks alot guys!

Yes, Global Greenhouse or GGL is big in Humboldt and some other areas. It is not heavily marketed or distributed. They are good quality ballasts. Thousands are in use in Humboldt County. Surprising how few people have heard of them outside HumCo. They have been around as long as Lumatek and been through some design changes.

 

[KBzombie]

I've been running 1000 watt NextGens w/ Ushios for a couple of years now with out a single problem!

 

[Globel]

Yes, Global Greenhouse or GGL is big in Humboldt and some other areas. It is not heavily marketed or distributed. They are good quality ballasts. Thousands are in use in Humboldt County. Surprising how few people have heard of them outside HumCo. They have been around as long as Lumatek and been through some design changes.

I have some GGL's that are at least 2 years old (600's), Still work.

I have accumulated about 30 or so GGL ballast i have replaced 2. I have 3 different style 1000's some with and some without fuse's.

 

[JollyGreen]

If you guys want a real good digital ballast with a 5 year warranty, dimmable option w/ hypo lumens, and runs cold to the touch. Get this http://hypotekballast.com/

 

[mendoman]

Prodigy Ballast

my local store in sacramento sells a new line of ballasts called Prodigy. Between me and my friends we have a few dozen and we have all been very happy and impressed. They have every feature of all the older name ballasts and the prices are amazing. No bulb chatter, dimmable, and selectable watt. 5 yr warranty!!anyone looking for good electronic ballasts should check them out good nature garden is store name and website is goodhydro.com....time to blaze.later

 

[OnlyKush]

Don't matter they're all made in china anyway

 

[Tommyvuitton]

I got two 1000w nexgens running the Digilux bulbs, nO problems so far and I'm putting out 310 000 lumens!

 

[devilbutt]

quantum

I have a 1000w quantum, its about a year old works great with a plain ge or phillips bulb. the dimmable feature is handy for the start and end of your grow as well as hot days. as for the power factor being 99.9 this is only possible with an electronic ballast. with a magnetic ballast the coil that creates the magnetic part also creates inducive reactance which is like resistance... leading to wasted energy. far to complicated to get into here.

 

[symbiote420]

I got two 1000w nexgens running the Digilux bulbs, nO problems so far and I'm putting out 310 000 lumens!

I just wanted to state that adding bulbs doesn't increase lumens, it only increases the light footprint/spread. You will have more coverage but the lumens stay at 155,000. And at 310k lumens, the sun doesn't even put out that many lumens. Watts and coverage increase but lumens do not.

 

[Calgreen]

Ive heard lunateks a the highest selling ballast out there. So if there are like 100000 lumakteks and only 10000 quantums youll see alot more bad lumateks than quantums just becaise of the sheer numbers. My lumateks havent given me any problems. I was gonna get more of em until i read this thread and seen all the trash talk about them. Im not sure what to think now.

 

[TrichromeFan]

Solis Tek. That is the latest shiz nit. GoD used them for his build for Avalon wellness. They will automatically turn on in sequence with a delay in between each ballast firing up. No fans to break. They even have an advanced unit that has a remote for programming, and has built in timer as well. Nicest ballast that I have ever seen.

-TF

 

[ttystikk]

Solis Tek. That is the latest shiz nit. GoD used them for his build for Avalon wellness. They will automatically turn on in sequence with a delay in between each ballast firing up. No fans to break. They even have an advanced unit that has a remote for programming, and has built in timer as well. Nicest ballast that I have ever seen.

-TF

I built my whole lighting setup around magnetic ballasts, for several reasons:

1. I wanted reliability, or at least a quick fix. Last time a ballast blew a capacitor, the local hydro store had it fixed in 4 hours.

2. Guaranteed compatibility with most bulbs. Some bulbs don't work well with digital ballasts and I couldn't afford the super duper stuff.

3. Cost. At least up front, they're very reasonably priced. I guess I'm spending the savings through lower efficiency, but...?

4. Flip box compatible- too many digital ballasts have issues running through flip boxes, and I wanted to be certain I had this option open.

I am always ready to upgrade to better gear, IF said gear is really better and the price isn't prohibitive. I haven't heard enough about Solis Tek to know if they adequately address my concerns above? I too was warned off Lumatek ballasts, and this was from a hydro store that sells them!

 

[ttystikk]

Features I need in a 1000W digital ballast:

1. Stable, no flicker, no nasty hum, no super high frequency harmonics that screw with bulbs

2. Dimmable, at least to 750 and 600

3. Overboost, to 1100 or 1150 watts, to wring the last month or two of usefulness out of older HID bulbs.

4. FLIPBOX compatible, most digital ballasts freak out and shut down when flipped.

5. Stone axe reliable. No light, no grow, therefore, no excuses.

It would be nice to have a built in hot strike delay timer, but again if it gets confused by flipbox then I'm not buying it.

It would also be nice to have a startup delay, so the entire rack of ballasts doesn't hit the breaker all at once.

 

[Olyver]

I have a couple prototype ballats that have the following features;

- Flip Box compatible, will shut OFF/ON ballast from 1 second to 15 minutes.
- Internal Microcontroller to control timing cycles.
- Wireless Bluetooth Control.
- Electronic Dimming for 110%, 100%, 75%, and 50%, no manual selection,
all controlled by a microcontroller.
- Hot Start Delay from 1 minute to 15 minute, adjustable.
- Flip Box Link, switches Flip Box relay ON and OFF while ballast is OFF.
- Programmable Start-Up delays from 1 second to 5 minutes.
- Ballast and Bulb counter to tell you how many hours your ballast and bulb
have been ON.


There are few more features I am working on. The PCB is easy to duplicate and the components are pretty easy to obtain. Hopefully early next year I will be manufacturing them here in Canada. Electronic ballasts don't need to be manufactured in China or Japan. The Anodized Aluminum Housing is also easy to obtain.

So far, the only ballasts I've found that are reliable, are the Quantums and Solis-Tek. There are over 20 different suppliers/manufacturers of electronic ballasts, so it's a bit of a crap shoot to decide which ones are the best.

I contacted these guys three times; http://genesisballast.com, but they never responded. Looks like their website is wishful thinking.

 

[mmcan]

can someone tell me which quantum 1000w is the best and where is a good place to buy? also what bulb would you recommend?

 

[mmcan]

Solis Tek. That is the latest shiz nit. GoD used them for his build for Avalon wellness. They will automatically turn on in sequence with a delay in between each ballast firing up. No fans to break. They even have an advanced unit that has a remote for programming, and has built in timer as well. Nicest ballast that I have ever seen.

-TF

hi can you tell me where you get your solis teks from?

 

[smalltime99]

hi can you tell me where you get your solis teks from?

How many are you trying to get?

 

[mmcan]

20

 

[mmcan]

sent