Cable company knocked on the door...Help!

So I set up my 600W MH/HPS a few days ago. Today the cable company knocks on my door to let me know they need to checkout my line coming into my house because they detected interference in the neighbourhood and isolated it to my property. I say no problem, have at it. I then pause and start to think...so I run into my grow room and shut down the light. The guy knocks on my door 2 minutes later and says. "the problem's disappeared", must have been a loose connection or something...happans all the time.

So I'm thinking my new 600W light is a no go . The guy was clearly from the cable Co. Truck with hydraulic lift and all, plus he presented me ID.

So now what do I do? The 600W MH light is still off.

Oh I'm in Vancouver CAN, so not like I'm too worried about the authorities...I only have 6 plants...

i dont think a light would have anything to do with the cable connection

i think like he said it was just a loose wire and this kind of thing happens all the time.

turn your light on and see if hes back tomorrow

Vansterdam said:

So I set up my 600W MH/HPS a few days ago. Today the cable company knocks on my door to let me know they need to checkout my line coming into my house because they detected interference in the neighbourhood and isolated it to my property. I say no problem, have at it. I then pause and start to think...so I run into my grow room and shut down the light. The guy knocks on my door 2 minutes later and says. "the problem's disappeared", must have been a loose connection or something...happans all the time.

So I'm thinking my new 600W light is a no go . The guy was clearly from the cable Co. Truck with hydraulic lift and all, plus he presented me ID.

So now what do I do? The 600W MH light is still off.

Oh I'm in Vancouver CAN, so not like I'm too worried about the authorities...I only have 6 plants...

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HID ballasts can give off some Electromagnetic interference. My cell phone cuts out when I get too close to mine. I also have a remote control that doesn't work when the lights are on. As soon as the lights turn off it works fine.

yesh my cellphone service is affected by my 1000 mh as well. if i were you id take it back and buy a digital ballast. i dont have that option so after i harvest im going to buy one..

KaleoXxX said:

i dont think a light would have anything to do with the cable connection

i think like he said it was just a loose wire and this kind of thing happens all the time.

turn your light on and see if hes back tomorrow

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Nope, I'm pretty sure that it's my setup...the cable company manages internet and so on. There's too much of a coincidence that as soon as I turned my system off, the guy says the problem went away...he didn't actually address a loose wire, he just didn't have an explanation. He said he had a partner in another truck up the street with some sort of scanner...

sourdieselismyonlyfriend said:

yesh my cellphone service is affected by my 1000 mh as well. if i were you id take it back and buy a digital ballast. i dont have that option so after i harvest im going to buy one..

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It is a Digital Ballast

http://www.gyosupplies.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=76

Its probably EM interference. Constuct a faraday cage around your ballast. Its a mesh cage so air will still flow, but no EM can leave. (its a scientific device, not voodoo magic..really do look it up..its just a mesh cage).

prot

man, thats pretty crazy, i would never even have thought that this would happen, but it sounds like your probably right about it though.. did he say who's cable it was interferring with? i don't know if it is feasible or not, but maybe you could try and move the ballast somewhere different and see if that helps.. if not, i would like into that box tihng that dude was talking about..
goodluck with it though..

racerboy71 said:

man, thats pretty crazy, i would never even have thought that this would happen, but it sounds like your probably right about it though.. did he say who's cable it was interferring with? i don't know if it is feasible or not, but maybe you could try and move the ballast somewhere different and see if that helps.. if not, i would like into that box tihng that dude was talking about..
goodluck with it though..

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no persons house in particular. He explained to me that their lines are automated for interference problems; a crew rooms the neighbourhood with some kind of scanning device (they are disbatched to neighbourhood first) and find the area or house that presents the problem.

My wife told me a few minutes ago that she had problems with our digital cable signal the other day, but didn't put 2 and 2 together.

I think the safe bet for me is to get rid of the HID unfortunatley and go CFL and LED...I'll look into the faraday cage first, but still, LED and CFL will also cure the heat problem i was experienceing...I didn't think the HID purchase through before I pulled the trigger. I'm really surprised...I thought these digital ballasts were suposed to be bullet proof...

Vansterdam said:

Nope, I'm pretty sure that it's my setup...the cable company manages internet and so on. There's too much of a coincidence that as soon as I turned my system off, the guy says the problem went away...he didn't actually address a loose wire, he just didn't have an explanation. He said he had a partner in another truck up the street with some sort of scanner...

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honestly cable guys could give 2 shits about cable. (atleast around my area) they are paid by the job. so if they go out and theres a problem, they go in an it disappears. the cable guy gets paid without doing anything. is your grow next or near the cable line? or a reciever?

Vansterdam said:

no persons house in particular. He explained to me that their lines are automated for interference problems; a crew rooms the neighbourhood with some kind of scanning device (they are disbatched to neighbourhood first) and find the area or house that presents the problem.

My wife told me a few minutes ago that she had problems with our digital cable signal the other day, but didn't put 2 and 2 together.

I think the safe bet for me is to get rid of the HID unfortunatley and go CFL and LED...I'll look into the faraday cage first, but still, LED and CFL will also cure the heat problem i was experienceing...I didn't think the HID purchase through before I pulled the trigger. I'm really surprised...I thought these digital ballasts were suposed to be bullet proof...

Click to expand...

its not illegal to own the lights and they dont have permission to enter the property without permission. they have to deal with it from the outside..thats it!!

Digital ballasts are much better. Analogue ballasts don't get 100% of the lights potential (according to our hydro store guy) a digital 600w will run at 600w, an analogue may only run at 550w.

You will never get the same out of cfl and led as you will out of a ballast, but if its personal only then you will be fine! You could also try plugging the ballast into another circuit...to find anothr circuit plug a lamp into each power point in the grow room, turn them all on...go to your fuse box and switch one of the power circuits off. Half the lamps should be out in your room now. These are circuit (a). If your ballast was previously in one of these plugs it was in circuit (a) before.
If it was in a plug now occupied by a glowing lamp it was circuit (b).

Now if it was circuit (a) before, plug it into circuit (b) now. And vice versa.

If you want my honest opinion heres what i would say is happening, and why i think so:

The ballast is sitting right next to a wall or floor where the cable for your paytv runs, or on the other side of a wall with a pay tv box or some sort of paytv cabling or hardware.

This is a problem because if you take a wire connected to nothing, and put it near an active power line you actually generate electricity in that wire(Well you induce current). Coaxial cable as used in cable tv actually has a grounded sheath around the outside. This is LITERALLY a faraday cage built right into the cable, as they are VERY sensitive to outside interference. Is your ballast near a wall with a paytv outlet? Or near the back of your television?

Try moving the ballast to the other side of the room, switch it on and ask your wife to check the signal.

Prot

Ballast is near an open cable receptacle, but i have no solution to move it. My grow room is a 10X15 finished space in a loft. The Ballast is already as far from the receptacle as it could be. There's a door that leads to the roof, which i keep partly open to maintain 80 degrees. Come summer that room is going to be 90-100 degrees. I'll get 2 UFO's and 4-6 200W CFL's...1600-2,000W equivalent, hopefully it'll work out as well as the 600...