Home Depot Ballast

[Firefish]

I found a H.O. ballast at HD and was wondering if anyone knew if these ballasts would fire up a 4' VHO bulb?

[icemark]

nope the HO ballast only puts out 800Ma , VHO needs 1200Ma+ to fire. Tried it already.

Sorry

[Firefish]

Hi Icemark, The ballast I picked up at HD says:

2 F96T12 HO 2.10 line current amps
2 F96T12 HO ES 1.75 line current amps
2 F84T12 HO 1.90 line current amps
2 F72T12 HO 1.75 line current amps

Model # 480-SLH-TC-P

Says it will power 110 watt high output lamps with a MIN. of 830 ma. for ES lamps... Is this the same ballast you tried???

Thanks.....

[Firefish]

Never mind on the above question...I bought an IC 660. ;)

[icemark]

Yep that was the ballast... Someone at a pseudo non-profit suggested that you could take the + wires from the first bulb, hook it up for one side of the VHO, and the + wires from the other bulb and use that as the other side of the VHO bulb and it would light one...

It didn't, nor did it light one wired normal, with or without a ground plane nearby.

They also have an instant start one that I didn't try, but they had it on sale and said I couldn't return it if it didn't work, so I didn't try it.

The IceCap is a much better ballast.

[Firefish]

Thanks Icemark, I figured I'd just do it right...didn't want to screw with a micky mouse ballast.