Need help with wiring.. am I missing something?

This is what I have.. I tried looking for an adapter at Lowes and such.. how the heck do I wire this thing!? Lamens terms please!

 

It appears the "male" coming off the reflector is proprietary. You could contact the manufacturer of the reflector for a suitable connector, or simply cut it off and splice the 3 wires coming off the balast, matching white, black, and green.

Not too difficult. I'd use butt splices. Google them, they're fairly easy to use, but require a pair of crimpers to do it correctly. After crimping, tape it up securely. Hope that helps.


In the pic, the bottom three tubs contain butt splices. You strip away an equal amount of insulation on each wire; place them in the barrel making sure no copper is exposed, then use the tool to crimp it down. This makes a permanent, non-reversible splice. If you've done it correctly, it's quite safe--as no copper is exposed, and it's very strong. A few wraps of tape gives insurance.

 

+1 to the above.. I would splice the wire and seal them up.. Its easy as pie..

 

Butt splice. LOL

It's a funny term, but yeah the best idea to wire this up.

Make sure to use electrical tape or a heat shrink tubing over each connection. And please connect the ground wire too, far too many times I see the ground wire left unhooked.

See the end on the ballast with the funky connection is a sunlight supply type connection, while the one that came with the pendant is the computer power cord type. I prefer the computer type one as they are easy to get, and every time a computer dies, you have a spare

 

Just connect the ground wire to the other groundwire.. right?

 

White to white, black to black, green to green, Aqualung. (So yes).

 

Btw is safe to use the dimmer on this ballast with a 250w bulb. I was gonna dim it to 150w for acclimation

 

the plug coming off the reflector is a PC computer plug Female end.. you could take the male side off a pc cord wire it to the ballast and have it where it still disconnects. yeah color to color is the way it goes.

btw there are two styles of connectors.. one is seamless the other has a seam. look inside the plastic insulation.. You want to crimp on the side opposite the seam. If you dont, you wont get a good crimp and the wire usually falls out. I just buy seamless connectors though.

 

As long as the dimmer is on the ballast itself, it should be compatible with any bulb to which it connects. I'm guessing this ballast is multi-tapped (has a selector switch for different wattage bulbs). If that's the case, then yes, it would be fine.

 

The guage of the ballast wire seems thicker than a pc cord.. is that ok