ballasts?

[membrainophones]

hey people im new to growing and am setting up my grow room slowly and ive come to the lighting part im curious about ballasts do i absolutely have to have ballasts for my lights my grow room has 220 and 120 voltage outlets and i was wondering if they make hps or hallide bulbs that dont require ballasts from what ive been reading it seems the ballast just converts 120 into 220 volts is that correct or am i completly wrong about what a ballast is for

 

[tellno1]

completely wrong .. all hps and mh bulbs need ballasts .. the ballasts plug into 110 or 220 depending on how they are wired .. as in bulb into socket wired to ballast which is pluged into 110v or 220v

 

[goten]

You cant just plug up your hps light and it cut on

the ballast powers it ,

Idk the electrical aspects of it all either

But i do know it wont cut on without the ballast , i tried years ago when i first started out and nothing lol

 

[membrainophones]

what exactly is the ballast for then is it basically like a battery/generator for the light bulb?

 

[tellno1]

no it acts like a tranformer to pulse high voltage to your light bulb

 

[Keefers26]

what exactly is the ballast for then is it basically like a battery/generator for the light bulb?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_ballast

 

[membrainophones]

cool thanks for the help guys guess theres no way around the ballast then such a shame there pretty pricey