is my ballast lying to me???

Hi, im not sure if this is the right place to ask this so please forgive me if its not!! ive bought a second hand ballast/cool tube and hps bulb, 600w, the ballast though looking oldish seems to run nice and quiet, its a powerplant horticultural lighting ballast and it has written on its plate, 250w 3 amp mh/hps,400w 4.6 amp mh/hps, 600w 6.2a mh/hps, 1000w 10.3a mh/hps, ive a 600 hps running fine on it but i cant get any info as to whether it would run any other lamps? im a noob at al this and have read about some ballast switching from mh to hps but theres no switch on this? i just cant figure out why it would list the sisez etc if it didnt do them, has any one any ideas please??

do you know what the ballast model and brand is, so i can probably look it up and se it for myself?

hi thanks for reply, the only thing written on its id plate is power plant horticultural lighting ballast etc etc and its made by powerplant lighting, it does look oldish and all the writings on a proper id plate etc any idea would be apreciated as its got me stumped!!!

"the ballast though looking oldish seems to run nice and quiet, its a powerplant horticultural lighting ballast "

oops, read your firsst post carefully and it was there, sorry! ok, imma check it out! ^__^

i think it's only meant for 600watt, i didn't find anything indicating that it can take any other watt, but it should be able to light an MH conversion bulb!

well thanks for searching etc, i was hoping it would do a 600 mh, but as you say a conversion would be the way to go!
really apreciate that,

thats right. this is what i have been saying about ballast for a long time now. what you have is a 1000wtt hps ballast that will run all those diffrent wtt bulbs mh or hps... a ballast is just a power plant of its on just like a generator... so if you have a ballast that says 600wtts. you can run 250wtt, 400wtt,600wtt bulbs in it.

post a pic of it and of what it says on the plate

Hi, tried to take pics and it all went wrong, light reflection,.... brothers a sparks and said to open it up and have a look if theres anything inside, just done it and inside it says venture 400w hps/mh, !!!!!! im fuming, my cooltube and bulb are 600, i thought it was very orangey, bought it from my local shop all be it second hand, surely it cant be good a 400 ballast with 600 lamp?? luckily i also have a poot light with digi ballast that is 600 so all is not lost but im straight down the shop tomozz, they know its my first grow etc and i know i have glasses but come on!!
well thanks for the interest/help
cozz

cozz said:

Hi, tried to take pics and it all went wrong, light reflection,.... brothers a sparks and said to open it up and have a look if theres anything inside, just done it and inside it says venture 400w hps/mh, !!!!!! im fuming, my cooltube and bulb are 600, i thought it was very orangey, bought it from my local shop all be it second hand, surely it cant be good a 400 ballast with 600 lamp?? luckily i also have a poot light with digi ballast that is 600 so all is not lost but im straight down the shop tomozz, they know its my first grow etc and i know i have glasses but come on!!
well thanks for the interest/help
cozz

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at this point all you can do i buy a 400wtt bulb for you cool tube setup.