30” Odyssea Metal Halide System 380W Review

Mounting Legs

I need to order the hanging kit, but for now the legs that it came with will do. I must say, after hearing from others that the mounting legs were REALLY bad I expected the worst. You know what, I was impressed. They must of updated them. The plastic VERY strong & pretty simply to install. Well sorta. On the last leg I had to use a hammer & a flathead screwdriver to drive the metal clip on to the fixture. The taps weren't perfect on the metal clip & didn't have a vise handy to correct the problem.

On the last pic, you can see where I had to flip the legs so it could fit on the top of my tank.

 

I had to do the same thing. I squeezed one together to make it fit easier and then it was a little too loose.. So I think they're suppose to be really tight like that.

 

Mine never got hot at all.

 

Mounted on my tank.

 

PC lighting on

 

Moon lighting on. 2nd pic I delayed the lens on my camera to capture in the dark to show a better effect of the moon light.

 

MH on. Water much clearer.

 

WOW!!! I can't believe i'm actually saying this, but even that pc only picture is sweet! congrats dude!! I can't imagine how happy you must be! Got any up close tank shots?

 

Changed Ballast Wire

When I was first connected the power wire from the ballast to the fixture I noticed it wasn't connecting right. Very loose & won't connect firmly on the plug. So I grabbed an AC computer power cable & pluged it into the fixture (of course NOT plugged into outlet!). It was a LOT better.

So, I made up my mind that I had to change it. Good thing, I found a metal splinter that was about an inch & a half long laying on the PC board in the ballast! That would of caused failure or possible fire at some point.

To open the ballast, unscrew the 4 screws on the panel that has the vent on it. The top metal cover will slide to that side & remove it.

I can not stress enough. DO NOT TOUCH any components on the circuit board!! Those things that look like drums are capacitors & act as batteries & pack a NASTY punch. Enough to knock you into next week. No I'm not joking. If you don't have a clue do NOT attempt what I did!!!

I cut the wire that goes from the ballast to the fixture. Pulled the neutral (WHITE) & hot (BLACK) wires out of the remaining shielding in order to remove the plastic plug that holds the wire into the ballast.

 

I cut the three prong plug off the computer power cable. Installed it into the ballast using the original retainer plug to hold the wire into the ballast. Trimmed all the wires to the proper lengths. As you can see there is a green wire that I have covered with heatshrink tubing. The orginial cable only had 2 wires, but the fixture plug has a three wire configuration. Not sure if the fixture is using it as a ground. Will have to check that out at a later date.