How to tell the difference between Metal Halide and High Pressure Sodium Growlights.
www.3rlighting.com/tutorial
How to tell the difference between a Metal Halide Lamp and a High Pressure Sodium Lamp
A Metal Halide Lamp burns more blue, while a High Pressure Sodium
burns more yellow or red.
Say you just bought a light fixture at a garage sale or your roomate
left town without paying the back rent, then leaves a message on your
machine saying the light fixtures in his closet are worth "way more
than the money I owe". How do you know what you have?
Can you use them to grow tomatoes instead?
First, all the high quality manufacturers will put a sticker on the ballast
case. High Pressure Sodium is abbreviated "HPS". Metal Halide is abbreviated "MH".
There is also a Wattage number. Common wattages are 1000, 400, 250, and 100. You can also run across Wattages such as 430, 270, 175, and 1075; these are a lot less common and indicate perhaps a mixed spectrum
lamp.
If there is no sticker on the ballast, you have to try to identify the lamp
(the bulb is usually referred to as a "lamp", the ballast, hood, and connecting wires are called a "light system" or "fixture").
A word of caution here--
The purpose of a ballast is to step up the voltage from the 115V coming out of your wall to say 500 Volts or so needed to run an HID lamp. There are homemade ballasts out there and some work just fine. Some ballasts have exposed wires and open ballast boxes. The high voltage wires can be dangerous. Notice I didn't say be careful with the wires because it may hurt if you touch them. I said "DANGEROUS".
I mean that.
3R Lighting sells high quality new light systems with totally enclosed ballasts. They are remarkable because they use an extruded aluminum case to dissipate the heat but the case never gets too hot to touch. Neither water nor little fingers can get in the vent holes. Whatever lights you use, if you are happy with them we will be happy with them.
