Wiring a Luxcore Ballast to a Spectra

choss · Dec 23, 2017

I have a 24" Spectra and am having trouble getting the metal halide to fire. I have the Luxcore 250 W- 400 W ballast. I wired the ballast to the Spectra attachment as follows:

white to brown
black to blue
green to green

I first tried plugging it into my DJ strip. Turning on the power does not light the bulb. I can hear only the faintest hum in the ballast (so silent I am almost not 100% sure its there). I then tried to plug the ballast directly into a GFI outlet and it trips the GFI instantly.

Any suggestions on what is going on here?

choss · Dec 24, 2017

reefndude · Dec 24, 2017

Are you sure the brown and blue wires aren't crossed? I have the luxcore ballasts and it is pretty quiet. I have two pendants and one takes about 5 minutes to fire up sometimes. I'm sure that's not right but I just lived with it

choss · Dec 24, 2017

Here is a picture of the full connection - White to brown at the top, blue and back in the middle, and green to green/yellow in the center.

But when I look at the white plastic plug supplied by Giesemann for the ballast connection, I see fine print on the plug as follows (from bottom to top)

1,2, +, N, 3

ballast connection by choerenz, on Flickr

Is it possible that the connections somehow don't go straight through? Is Neutral usually white?

reefndude · Dec 24, 2017

Try switching the black and white wire.

choss · Dec 25, 2017

I tried a few combinations last night. First I switched the black and white wires. This caused the GFI outlet to trip. Then I tried the white wire in the "N" slot, the black wire opposite the green/yellow wire, and attached the green wire from the ballast to an empty slot (with no wire opposite it). Plugging this combo into the non GFI wall outlet got a glow started in the lamp. But it wasn't enough to fire. Plugging this combo into the GFI outlet resulted in the outlet tripping. SO its probably not the right combo but it does seem to indicate that its not the bulb or the spectra connection that is the issue.

choss · Dec 25, 2017

Update: I switched the white and black wires. Looking at US/European color odes for electrical this would make sense. Now the breaker on the GFI is not tripping and I am getting a brief flash of blue as the light tries to fire up. But it doesn't fully ignite. Maybe my ballast is bad? I need to contact BRS when they get back from their XMAS break.