anyone had expirence with both ? is heat the only difference? is it worth the extra $400 it would cost me for the electronic ballasts?

The e-ballast is not only cooler it uses less electricity and the bulbs burn longer and don't flicker. We have three 175 watt IceCap MH ballats and one 400 watt mag ballast and I just recieved two 400 watt Blueline e-ballast. The the electronic ballast cost more up front but I think that are worth the money in the long run.

I got my Bluelines (3 175 watt pendants) Yesterday. I have been running a triple 175w tar ballast for 3 years now and will make the transition in a few weeks.

I will definitely be posting my experience here so keep in touch!!



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Greg

Yes reefman let me know how much of a difference you have in your electric bill. I know i pay alot in electricity. I havbe 400 watt mag ballasts as well and could be a good thing if i could drop bill by a few each months

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This is the most addictive thing that i have ever come across as well as expensive

Yeah,
It will take a little time to see a couple months of electric bills come in, but in the meantime I do read my meter a couple times a week. I have made up a spreadsheet and have some "before" readings logged in already.

On 7/3 I made the transition so I will have to log in some "after" readings and see what happens from there.

I'll keep posting as time goes on....

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Greg

Hi All,

I am a EE and my tests indicate that the BlueLine 400 watt e-ballasts use 30% less electricity than transformer ballasts.

Also useful bulb life may be almost double. This is do too the ignition cycle, which with a transformer ballast the ignition surge “blasts” plating off of electrodes and contaminates the gas.

The only issue that I have had with these ballasts is the EMI issue, which I tamed with the appropriate filters.

Regards,

Scott

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The definition of an expert is a washed up drip under pressure.

Scott, how did you test for the energy savings? I was under the understanding that the eballasts really didn't matter that much on energy consumption. I thought it was like 10% or so. The advance 400W ballast I have indicates 468W input to burn at 400W. If the electronic ballast burns a 400W at 400W (100% effeciency) that would only be a 14.5% savings. Is there a way that the electronic ballasts can run a bulb on less watts? (confused look here)
No electrical engineer (CPA penny pincher) so point me to the errors in my thinking.
Thanks, Nathan
BTW at 30% savings that would be about $60 per year for 2 400W bulbs (8hrs per day at 8 cents per kwh). If you say twice as long on the bulbs then at another $60 per year. If they are $400 more they would pay for themselves in just over 3 years if you don't add in the present value of money factor.
I thought the Iwasaki bulbs already lasted nearly 2 years on a standard ballast though.
COntinually confused, Nathan

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Always get a 2nd opinion. (and a 3rd, 4th, etc...)
Check out my Homepage

Npaden

The published date for Blue line ballasts indicates 3.37 amps input for the 400 watt ballast vs. 5.4 amps for a “typical” transformer ballast.

3.37 amps at 120 volts would imply 404 watts. Input. I think that this is just a little optimistic.

I believe the input is closer to 3.8 amps. Or a 30% improvement, as I indicated.

The 468 watt figure that you cited would imply only 3.9 amps, which I am sure is more efficient (based on heat output) than any transformer ballast that I am familiar with.

To complicate maters further, transformer ballasts have a lousy power factor, which effects current input measurements.

It looks like I need to get out the amp meter and test my Blue line ballast to see how it measures up against the published specifications. I will try to get hold of a transformer ballast and take the same measurements.

An obvious measure of ballast efficiency is heat produced by the ballast (or lack thereof) The BlueLine 400 watt ballast never get more than warm to the touch. A PFO ballast, despite a much larger heatsink, gets quite warm.

Solid state ballasts also get more light output from a bulb for a given amount of watts in do to the high frequency drive. So maybe the published input specification for the BlueLine E-ballast is correct.

The bulb life is based on these factors:

1 A transformer ballast ignites the lamp with a hi voltage “spike”, high enough to ionizes the cold gasses in the lamp. This starting procedure blasts metal off of the electrodes and contaminates the gas. A solid state ballast is able to start the lamp much more gently with its high frequency drive. A lamps life may be as impacted by the number of on/off cycles as actual number of hours in service.

2 I believe that solid state ballasts run the bulbs cooler for a given light output due to the even more ignition of the gas, also a result of the high frequency drive.

3 Bulb life is also related to color temperature, the general rule of thumb is that the higher temperature bulbs have shorter useful lives than lower temperature ones. Hence, 6.5K Iwasaki lamps last longer than German 10K’s which last longer than German 20K’s

I also need to do light output measurements to qualify some of my previous assumptions.

I planned on submitting an article on these issues to Aquarium Frontiers but some other projects came up.

I will update this board when I get some of my own qualified and quantified data.

Regards,

Scott

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The definition of an expert is a washed-up drip under pressure.

Hi All,

Update:

Using one of my trusty true RMS Fluke model 87 Multimeters, the measured input current to my BlueLine 400-watt ballast is 3.31 amps at 121 volts ac.

This equals 400.5 watts. Even this ballast could not be efficient enough to be driving the lamp at 400 watts, i.e. only ½ watt lost to heat.

The next step is to compare the light output in lux against a transformer ballast. I suspect that the solid state ballast and light combination will be brighter than with a transformer ballast, but we shall see.

The plot thickens!

Scott

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The definition of an expert is a washed-up drip under pressure.

Scott,
Here is the spec sheet on the advance transformer ballast that I have spec sheet
It shows 4.0 amps "operating" line current (I thought it was 3.9 but I was wrong)
At the bottom of the sheet it shows "input current" with a range of 2.4 to 3.6 amps.
I'm not sure why that would be lower.
Oh well, let me know if you test one and they come out way different than the spec sheets. The heat waste does make sense that it would be running more efficiently, just how much is what we all want to know!
Thanks, nathan

Scott,

Thanks for all of this info. I chose the e-ballast because my tank is in a class room and then entire room is on one circuit. Unfortunately the plant manager does not know if the circuit is 15 or 20 amps. (I just smile! isn't this his job to know?) Since I have a 400W projector that I run during lectures I did not want the metal halide to blow a circuit. Even with the heater on I think I should be below 12 amps at the very highest (probably more like 10) So your work is VERY much appreciated. Keep us posted!

Hi Scott:

You mentioned "power Factor" in a previous post. I am somewhat confused and hope you can clarify the matter.

This is a quote from a product review by Richard Harker published on Aquarium Frontiers: "One other note regarding the measurement of power. Power consumed by a purely resistive load is calculated using Ohm's law - current times voltage. However, few electrical devices are purely resistive. most include inductive of capacitive components that make power measurements more complicated. Apparent power is the term applied to the product of current and voltage (Oppenheimer and Borchers 1963). True power is apparent power times the power factor of the device being measured (the cosine of the angle between the current and voltage vectors). This is important when measuring power consumption of electronic ballasts, as the power factor can be well below unity. The significance of the distinction between apparent and true power is that power consumption as measured by your utility company is based on true power, not apparent power."

I thought I had a good grasp of the concepts and from the above I would have expecte
d that the power factor, for a magnetic ballast at least, would exceed unity.

My confusion came about as a result of reading the Ballasts Specifications on the Champion Web site. The specs apparently came from the manufacturer and Perry could not answer my questions and he made me feel like a jerk for asking. He suggested I ask Richard Harker.

For example, a comparison between a 400W Magnetic Ballast and a 400W E-Ballast gives the following values, which are consistent with your earlier post Scott:

Input Voltage: 120V for both ballasts

Input Current: Magnetic 5.4 Amps
E-Ballast 3.37 Amps

Power Factor: Magnetic 0.67
E-Ballast 0.99

THD: Magnetic 33%
E-Ballast 5%

Current Crest Factor: Magnetic 1.7
E-Ballast 1.5

I would have expected the power factor for the magnetic ballast to be 1.62 rather than the 0.67 listed.

If True Power = Apparent Power x Power Factor

Power Factor= 648W (120Vx5.4A)/400W= 1.62

I must be missing something here?

Could you also explain the concepts of THD and Current Crest Factor. Thanks a bunch. It's great to have an EE so willing to help. The people of Reefs.org are going to miss you.

Claude

Claude,

I will post a complete response when I get some more time.

But one point that I would make:

The stated consumption of the BlueLine ballasts vs. a magnetic ballast should be a reflection of the relative efficiencies of the ballasts, not dependent on power factor considerations per say. In other words, 60Hz ballasts (transformers) are less efficient because of copper losses, eddy currents, the nature of oscillator, etc. This manifests itself in terms of heat production by the respective ballasts. Power factor is just a complicating aspect as it effects how we measure and are charged for our electricity.

Regards,

Scott D Passe

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The definition of an expert is a washed-up drip under pressure.

Thanks Scott, I'll be looking forward to your answer.

If manufacturers would only tell us three things:

- at what wattage(s) the ballast runs,
- how much power it consumes to run at a particular wattage,
-and how much of that power goes to light vs heat,

we, as hobbyist without engineering degrees, might be able to compare and draw our own conclusions and know what to expect our electric bills to be. The purchase price is a one time thing, the electric use goes on. I resent being treated like a jerk for asking questions [img]/ubb/mad.gif[/img]

I want the best for my corals at the best price. I don't want to try 2 or 3 different set ups before I find it. Not everyone in the hobby is wealthy.

Claude

I would get the E-ballast.For the extra money you will save more money in the long term.It may require more money up front but it will save you lots and lots of money.

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Please visit my Webpage at Phils Reef Page

Claude,

I am not an Electrical engineer, but I am a science teacher. I think you are confusing electrical efficiency with the power factor. The power factor, as you state, is the cosine of the angle between the current and the voltage in an AC-circuit. The power factor can NEVER exceed 1. A power factor of 0.99 (if this is true) is an extremely well tuned system. The power factor can be thought of as the ratio of the power applied to the power consumed. In other words your house hold socket must supply the electronic balast with 404 W of energy so that it can consume 400 W of energy. You are correct in stating that we actually pay for the usage of 404 W even though the device can only use 400 W.

Now, the balast takes that wattage and converts most of that energy to the output of the bulb. But due to the shackels of thermodynamics, whenever you transform energy from one form to another, some gets wasted. So the electronic ballast looses a little of its enegy as heat. It looses FAR less energy to heat than an old style balast does, but some loss is inevitable. This is why the old balasts draw so much current, they are inefficient and much of the power is wasted as heat. This is a very different effect than the loss due to the power factor however.

As I said, I am not trained in electronics, but I do teach this stuff every year. I hope I have been doing it right!! ;-)

Hi MicroReefer:

Thanks for the clarification. I understand the concepts. My problem surfaced when I tried to apply Richard's equation and it did not give the expected results (Champion figures). I guess I should have checked my trig book, probably all moldy and chewed by silverfish by now [img]/ubb/smile.gif[/img]. It would not have helped figuring the power factor but at least I would have realized it could not be over 1.[img]/ubb/embarass.gif[/img]
Claude

From IceCap:
Our MH E-Ballasts, 175 and 250 watt, run at 97% efficiency according to an independent evaluation we had done. We will shortly post these and other results on our site. We are not able to post light output levels with a degree of accuracy that would be worth evaluating in my opinion. We have posted a review by Richard Harker in Aquarium Frontiers (on our Model 175-MH shortly after it was released) before some later upgrades were made, that does discuss light output. See our MH page on www.icecapinc.com .
Andy

Thanks Andy,

Just the kind of info we need. I'll keep an eye on your web site for the posting.

Claude

Microreefer,

Thank you for that summary.

I have so many irons in the fire right now that I couldn’t post a detailed response.

On the subject of power factors, some literature indicates power factors of as low as 50% on certain kinds of transformer ballasts. A solid state switching power supply, which is a simplified model of an electronic ballast, can be power factor corrected to figures like those stated by BlueLine.

I am having fun reviewing ballast theory such a Constant Wattage Autotransformer (CWA) which is the dominant approach to transformer ballasts. Also the effects of high frequency drive on metal halide lamps, in terms of light output, lamp life, etc.

As I stated in my earlier post, I have confirmed the published current draw for the 400-watt BlueLine ballast.

What is proving harder to validate, at least until I get some samples to play with, is the current draw of the transformer ballasts. Given the known difference in heat produced by transformer vs. solid state ballasts, it is obvious that solid state ballasts are more efficient, but until I can run my tests, I cannot quantify this amount.

Also I am interested in quantifying ultimate efficiency, i.e. watts in vs. light out. In addition to higher electrical conversion efficiencies, Certain solid state metal halide ballasts (like IceCap) have demonstrated to ability to cause metal halide lamps to put out substantially more light for a given amount of wattage input.

One more area to research is how our utility service use meters react to varying power factors. I have some theories on this subject, but I need to do some more research.

Regards,

Scott

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The definition of an expert is a washed-up drip under pressure.