Oh My! FIRE!

Understood, but if that's the case, I simply will have to run half my tank on GFCI, and half without. One EB8 with 4 lights and 4 other devices will not be on GFCI, one will. Not much I can do about the situation. I still have interference from the ballast with my Apex, so it seems that the ballasts are poorly designed, as LumaTeks and others run on GFCI with no issue. Coralvue doesn't trip them either, I believe. I'm going over to my buddy Bill's house tonight and will take a closer look at his setup, as I know all of his stuff is on GFCI and nothing trips. Ever. And they're e-ballasts.

Gabba, thank you very much for all the research. Very helpful information!

 

I can appreciate this post !

 

Zach, I know this would mean you'd have to drop some coin... but perhaps you could run GFCI's individually...

Since you're saying the ballast is causing interference with your controller, that's a big issue... perhaps the EMI is not well filtered! I think you said you had some ferrite chokes, have you tried these to quiet down the RFI?

 

I think a better way to say it is that it's not 'designed' in, but it is an inherent side-effect of an EMI filter. You can't normally have an effective EMI filter without having some leakage current because of the capacitance of the lines (hot and neutral) to ground as designed into the filter will leak a very small amount of current (enough to trip a GFCI). The capacitance is part of what kills the RFI, but it also creates an unwanted, but acceptable leakage current.

I suppose that leakage current could be minimized or at least balanced in some way so that these ballasts can work on a GFCI. That's what I'm looking into figuring out.

 

I had that same problem but it was my oddeysea light that was causing problems, the best day was when I got rid of that.

 

I am having a bit of a hard time with this. You got the information from Sunlight supply that the ballasts will trip a GFCI. How does a LumaTek ballast (by Sunlight Supply) run perfectly on a GFCI outlet without tripping it? The ballasts I am using are brand new, less than 2 months old, so I don't plan to replace them.

I'll run half my tank on a GFCI outlet or make the manufacturer replace them before I buy mag ballasts, and I live in an apartment, so my options are limited. I'll try the ferrites tomorrow to see what that does.

 

sorry...

Actually Sunlight Supply didn't know much about the ballasts they use... their 'head technician' named Ken couldn't tell me much and didn't know what an EMI filter was. He gave me the part # and supplier of the ballast (which I posted earlier). It's manufactured by Phillips. It was the engineer at Phillips that told me that KC's ballast on her Tek 5 lights have an EMI filter... it's the EMI filter that causes leakage current and thus trips the GFCI on that particular model... I would guess that other ballasts with this problem are using a similar EMI filter design.

Without more information, it's difficult to say. Do you or someone you know use the ballasts? You mentioned for me to look this ballast up earlier, but I wasn't aware that it was also a Sunlight Supply ballast... If you can provide part #'s for me and OEM manufacturer of the ballast, or at least the part # of the light it is in, then I can research it further. Sunlight Supply is not the OEM manufacturer of the ballasts they use.

If it were to work perfectly with a GFCI, then it must not have the leakage current that the previously mentioned Phillips ballast does... why this is, I wouldn't know without having more information about the ballast's circuit design, and specifically the EMI filter that is being used. Because there are several ways to build an EMI filter, it depends on what one manufacturer is doing as to why it may/may not work with the GFCI.

I am not suggesting you replace your ballasts... never meant for it to sound that way...

1. I was suggesting you purchase individual GFCI's for each piece of equipment that you want to run... There is no reason you cannot have more than one GFCI. I understand that you want your controller and other equipment on the GFCI and the 8 outlet box you use controls your lights on/off timing... You could put a GFCI on 6 of those outlets and run your lights off of the two remaining ones... this would mean you'd have to purchase multiple GFCI's... but before you do this, let's figure out a better solution.

2. The ballast may be functioning correctly, but it is not up to the manufacturer to guarantee that they will work on a GFCI.

3. The ferrites are suggested to stop the interference from the ballast to your probes and controller because you said that the interference was causing it to not work properly.

I'm sorry I'm confusing you... I understand how you want to run your set up and I want to help you get it working correctly because I understand this stuff... It will help me if I know more details about your set up though... What and how many ballasts are you running on what lights? Try to be as detailed about your setup as possible. manufacturers of the lights and/or ballasts, model numbers, etc is what I need to investigate further...

I may be able to work out a solution for you... I just don't want to jump to any conclusions yet b/c I do not know enough about your system. It may be a few days before I can get it all figured out... I feel I got lucky today when I got the right folks on the phone to help me figure out the issue with KC's ballasts...


BTW, how do you like the Apex controller? I'm thinking about getting one soon...

cheers!

Will

 

Very interesting gabba.

Workhorse ballasts for my t5s don't trip GCFI'a, neither do icecaps old style 250w e ballasts. Since my EE friend has GCFIs on everything, I know lumatek's don't trip GCFI's either.

Now here's the funny thing. He has 2 tek lights. Both on GCFI's as well. One is a 6x54w teklight, and the other is a 4x39w. No issues with GCFI trippage. He also has a 70w MH for his fuge (no idea of the ballast) a current nova extreme 4x39w and a 150w MH (jbj viper) on his 28g nano upstairs.

 

Oh yeah, I know I can't turn on the AM radio when my TAR m58 250w magnetics were on. FM, no problem, AM for a game was an issue.

Zach, I can't recall which SLS light ballast is giving you issues with interference, but if you are talking about a tek light, please be aware that not all tek lights have the same brand of ballasts. They swapped ballasts they used at some point.

I know a couple year old teklight that had to be repaired had an advance ballast, but I know some have workhorse ballasts in them too.

 

I use Vertex MH ballasts. Kacy uses the Tek.

Gabba, if you want to research, my ballasts are Vertex Aquaristik 250w metal halides. I run LumenMax Elite pendants with Phoenix 14k bulbs. I can only use 2 GFCI's. I have 2 EB8's (power strips for the Apex) and I control my devices through them. So I can't have a GFCI for each device. One for each EB8.

I am just going to run half the tank on GFCI and half without for now. It isn't really worrying me very much. I am actually more po'ed at the ballasts interfering with the temp probe on the Apex than anything. That is causing control issues and I don't have many options to isolate the probe / ballasts / controller. Something tells me if we get to the root of that interference problem we may find what trips the GFCI as well. Interference is coming from somewhere.

Also, I love the Apex. I highly recommend you pick one up.