Digilux MHs not firing properly, not making enough contact?

[dankworth]

So 2 of 4, then 3 of the same 4 Digilux MHs that showed up in the mail failed to ignite. Like it would start to fire up, then shut back off after 10-15 seconds.
I am guessing lack of contact from the threads is a culprit. I could swear the thread diameter of the MH male threaded part is slightly less than the digilux hps. Resulting in insufficient contact possibly.
I have read somewhere a long time ago that a solution to this is to smear a light coating of Vaseline around the threads. At first I was like WTF but then I saw how maybe this could in fact help.

Or is this just random advice from some dude all like
"Fuck, everything is better with vaseline smeared on it!"

Thoughts?

 

[leadsled]

Cornholio!

May be broken at the base, pull on the metal part of the bulb, if it pulls off the glass. it broke during shipping.

 

[dankworth]

Nope, not broken. Will try the vaseline trick later.
These guys ship pretty well, someone would have to kick the box around the room for a while in order to break it.

Teepee for my bunghole.

 

[dankworth]

Got them all to fire. They needed to be "conditioned".
I plugged them in where they tried to fire up, warmed up for 10-15 seconds.
Enough of these fairly back to back, and they fired up and stayed on.
Then I ran them for a while, and unplugged them for a while.
Only a few times of plugging and unplugging and they worked just like they should.
Wasted a couple hours fucking with them.
At least now they work. And they have lots of blue-green, so my chemo x og kicked the terpenes I have needed for so long.
My body finally shed something, let go of something, healed past the damage I had.
Dig the spectrum.

 

[Aerojoe]

Nope, not broken. Will try the vaseline trick later.
These guys ship pretty well, someone would have to kick the box around the room for a while in order to break it.

Teepee for my bunghole.

Glad you got this figured out DW, but just for the record I don't think it was vaseline. I think it was dielectric grease or something.

 

[dankworth]

Now you tell me not to apply vaseline to the male threaded portion.

 

[noone88]

Digilux bulbs are horrible. I bought a bunch because my shop was liquidating them because R&M didn't want to take back a couple cases of bulbs. I got them for $40 each. I had an approximate 20% failure rate within the first cycle.

 

[dankworth]

Digilux bulbs are horrible. I bought a bunch because my shop was liquidating them because R&M didn't want to take back a couple cases of bulbs. I got them for $40 each. I had an approximate 20% failure rate within the first cycle.

I have heard that they have had a bad batch, and that they are bitches about returns.
I have run I think a total of 15 so far with no problems other than this one with the MHs not wanting to fire right up. But others like noone88 have not had the same experiences.
I should look into specifics on Ushios, I have heard good things about them, and they are digital friendly lamps.

Edit-looked on the Ushio site, no appropriate metal halides for us it would seem.

 

[noone88]

I usually run ushios. Lately, i've been running Hortilux's since they've redesigned to run on digital ballasts.

Either way, digilux isn't that great. They're mid-tier when it comes to bulbs. There was that post on icmag where they tested a lot of bulbs against the gravita 1000 DE.

 

[dankworth]

Yeah, that DE is the shit. 5% annual lumen degradation rate, and mad PAR watts. I intend on upgrading to those when feasible.
Digilux is not as cool as some, but for the price I like them. I couldn't afford to relamp the room with hortis, and I have to do 1/2 hps and 1/2 mh, so I went with these.
But the failure rate sounds pretty high for a lot of you guys.
Gavita is the way, even their single-ended hps beat all the others I think.
I wish Venture had a Natural White in 1k MH. Then I would run 1/2 those and 1/2 Gavitas when I reinvested.