Actual Power Usage Readings of Dimmable Lumatek 1000 and Galaxy 1000 Ballasts

RemeberMe

Active Member
I have a Killawatt wattage recorder and decided to test the actual power usage of my new Lumatek 1000 HPS/MH dimmable ballast at it's different power settings. Previously, the only info I could find was that even though there are lower settings than 1000 (600 and 750) they used the same amount of power as the 1000. This I found to be completely FALSE. The setting of 600 used only 663 watts and the 750 setting used only 825 watts. This makes it a truly useful ballast for scaling down usage on days my grow room gets too hot to support the highest setting. I then checked the 1000 watt setting which used 1055 watts which is lower than the Galaxy that tested at 1080 watts. Another big surprise was the 110% reading required only 1090 watts, about the same as the Galaxy. With that low of a reading I doubt it gets brighter than the Galaxy even at it's highest setting.

I still have the Galaxy 1000 so I might go and get a light meter (cheap one but good for comparison) and test both the Lumatek and Galaxy and report back here what the light readings are for each setting as well.
 

Man o' the green

Active Member
I have a meter and two 600w Quantum Dimmable. I've had similar results, 50% power is approx 310w, 100% is 630w. I suspect that this is somewhat bulb-dependent, but both of my bulbs ( of different brands ) show about the same power consumption. Light output on partial power is still very high, at least to the naked eye, I'd be interested to hear what you find with a light meter.
 
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