400W Radiums on PFO Pulse Start Ballast

[Brian Ward]

I've been researching lighting and what it takes to run Radium bulbs. All the literature indicates that a pulse start ballast will light the bulbs. I know the standard PFO ballast won't run a radium bulb, but from what I'm reading the pulse start will. PFO's website also says that while the HQI ballast runs them best, the pulse start will also work. Anyone have any experience? I'm currently running the Ushio bulbs - which are also German and require pulse start, I'm just looking for more blue color. The 400W bulb washes out the actinics completely. If anyone happens to have a 400W Radium bulb I can try out, or knows from personal experience whether or not it will work, I'm very interested.

[yauger]

Brian, the abesolute best ballast you can run Radiums bulbs on would be a icecap electronic ballast. this ballast will drive a radium bulb very well without issues. I would stay away from PFO ballasts.

[ctenophore]

I have a used 4 month radium 400w, you can borrow it.

 

I thought the PFO HQI was supposed to be the best for radiums? Overdrives them a bit but gives them a nice blue/white color? No experience w/ this combo, just hearsay.

 

My experience w/ radiums on electronic ballasts is that they seem somewhat weak, but then again I'm a fan of 10k MH so anything next to those is going to look dim.

[gastone]

http://www.radium.de/e/produkte_overview.h...,1855,2498,2569

 

Here's radiums in a nutshell: 250w radium are spec'd at 270w. An electronic ballast will underdrive them. That's why for the 250, the M80 is the US spec'd ballast. Now, if you promise not to tell anyone I'll let you in on a little secret that was told to me... a 250 HPS (high pressure sodium) ANSI S50 will do the same thing... just much cheaper. In fact, even though my sig says I run the M80, I don't. I use the HPS ballast.

 

As far as the 400w version, it is spec'd at 360w. A 400w electronic will overdrive the the lamp, and an HQI (which in the 400w version is actually an HPS ballast and operates at 430w) will seriously overdrive the lamp. Robbie uses 400w radium I believe. I think the usable lifespan is 4-6 months. Replacing just 1 every 4 months ain't fun, if you have more than 1 to replace... ouch.

 

Now, I switched from an XM10k on an M58 to a radium on the S50. From Sanjay's website:

 

The diagram shows a 38% decrease in par. Now, be that as it may, the light was visibly/significantly brighter. So much so that I had to decrease my lighting cycle to 2 hours a day to start and then slowly up to 4 hours.

 

Garrett.

[Coral Hind]

Brian,

 

The 400W radiums are european spec bulbs and require a much higher starting voltage. That is why the pulse start ANSI M135/M155 or an HQI ballast is recommended.

 

Here is a good article by G.E. that explains the difference between the two types of bulbs and how to identify them. It also mentions the law that Bush signed to do away with probe start bulbs.

 

I tried the 20K bulbs for a year and I went right back to the 10Ks. The growth rate for me just stopped.

 

Most Ushio bulbs we see are made in America now or come from Japan, which is where the company is from.

[Brian Ward]

I went through Sanjay's site and he addresses the PFO HQI which does overdrive the bulb - and I've seen several other posts over on RC about that. However, I have the pulse start model, not the HQI model. The pulse start model provides the higher starting voltage that is required. It sounds like if I were running 250W, then it wouldn't work but on the 400W model it's possible. I'm going to get the bulb from Justin and see what the color and performance is with my ballast. I'm hopeful because I've seen several places that mention how the 400W seems to be less finicky than the 250W model.

[Coral Hind]

Garrett,

Do you have the ignitor of the HPS ballast wired into the circuit?

[gastone]

Garrett,

Do you have the ignitor of the HPS ballast wired into the circuit?

 

 

I do... I think. I haven't looked at it in quite some time, but I remember looking at the wiring diagram off the ballast when I got it and going, "what in the name of God is that????" I've wired my share of standard magnetic hallide ballasts, icecap 660s, workhorse, aro and the like, but this thing really confused my simple mind.

 

That was right around a year ago (mas o menos) and to date I've had no problems with it firing.

 

Ergo I'm assuming I got it right (or close enough).

 

G.

[guppychao]

brian, i got some used 400w radiums you can have too

let me know

[Brian Ward]

brian, i got some used 400w radiums you can have too

let me know

 

 

I actually got a bulb from ctenophore and it's working great. I want to get a PAR meter to be sure that's not to low down at the bottom - but the clams seem happy and i'm getting much better polyp extension than I was under the 14k. Right now I have 1 side Radium 20k and the other Ushio 14k. I'm probably going to order a set of Radium bulbs shortly.