Digital Ballast RF Interference

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tiredofbuyingit

Active Member
Hello,

I have a 600 watt hps with a digital greenhouse ballast. The cable company has cut off my service because they traced a cable "leak" to my house. I've had the ballast on for a couple months and haven't noticed any problems. They want to come inside and test the lines to see where the leak is before hooking my cable back up.

I made sure the ballast was in a grounded outlet. I've heard that the digital ballasts cause RF interference, but what can I do to shield this?

Thanks
 
M

MrJDGaF

Well-Known Member
If your power lead is like new, maybe wrapping foil tape around the power lead would help, or if you can cut off any spare to make the lead as short as possible would help too.:peace:
 
B

bryant228

Well-Known Member
You might want to post this in the "Indoor growing" section. It will get more hits and you'll get more feedback. There has to be a way to ground it. But I'm like you, when it comes to electrical, i'm dumber then shit.
 
The Stig

The Stig

Well-Known Member
interesting.. I didn't knew about the possible RF interference from the digital ballasts.

What I notice is that after I got my 600w greenhouse digital ballast from HTG NONE of my X10 devices work (they use RF controls and they send signals trough the power line, and they dont work at all with this ballast and I'm getting noise on all the power lines of the whole house)


seems to me like all this greenhouse ballast have this problem :cry:
 
AeroKing

AeroKing

Well-Known Member
My digital ballast causes some sort of interference. It really fucks up my 24-7 tri-meter when its on. I have to turn the light off to use the meter.
 
smoke and coke

smoke and coke

Well-Known Member
i dont have a digital ballast, but certain situations need a dedicated circuit with a dedicated ground back to the panel. this will help eliminate interference.
wires that are run inside ceiling and walls if run to close to each other or your tv, phone lines with cause interference.
the line filters BBB mentions are good idea.
you could have a loose ground connection somewhere, could be in an outlet or panel.
 
R

Ridgegoo

Active Member
being too close to the 1kW digital ballast/cordset makes my controller go crazy. It misreads temp/humidity badly.
 
BigBudBalls

BigBudBalls

Well-Known Member
Ridgegoo said:
being too close to the 1kW digital ballast/cordset makes my controller go crazy. It misreads temp/humidity badly.
Click to expand...
Try wrapping the cord set in tin foil. But make sure its only grounded on one end (both ends = grounded loop, bad thing) Which end is voodoo. Try and see. (can be also in the middle but thats rare)

Been down this route with freq drives. Sometimes having the cables jumbled up is better the neatly laid out.
 
S

stripeybeast

Active Member
will just the regular HTG supply ballasts do this? cuz i had a similar problem where the cable guy detected a signal leak from my place, but couldnt pinpoint it. I let him snoop around a bit, but obviously directed him away from my grow room.
 
mercilus

mercilus

Well-Known Member
I love the digital greenhouse ballast prices but def considering going with lumatek because of the better shielding... anyone with experience?
 
C

Cents1m

New Member
This is happening to me. I have even plugged my fan and controller into my neighbors house with an extension cord and my light In my house. As soon as the light kicks on the temp and humidity go blank which prevents it from kicking on or off on it's triggers. Super frustrating. Please let me know if you solved this.
 
OneHitDone

OneHitDone

Well-Known Member
Cents1m said:
This is happening to me. I have even plugged my fan and controller into my neighbors house with an extension cord and my light In my house. As soon as the light kicks on the temp and humidity go blank which prevents it from kicking on or off on it's triggers. Super frustrating. Please let me know if you solved this.
Click to expand...
Just curious what type of ballast it is giving you issues?
 
C

Cents1m

New Member
It's a 1000w cheap ass vivosun digital dimmable.... I have grown several times with these light and ballast with great results ( always use a different hps bulb) but yea that ballast is like a Electromagnetic dirty bomb
 
OneHitDone

OneHitDone

Well-Known Member
Cents1m said:
Going to try to move everything as far apart as possible and try to use "EMI cable filters"... Let you know if it works or not.
Click to expand...
That is one thing I always notice with off brand ballasts vs something like a Quantum. The Quantum ballast are clearly labeled FCC compliant and have filters on the ballast and power cables.
I've had the cable guy in the area where my grow is with ballasts running in the past looking for a system leak on my cable and the ballasts caused no interference issue :peace:
 
C

chronnie49

Well-Known Member
I would just replace the ballast with a better brand or even go with an old school magnetic ballast if money is an issue.
 
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