Timers

I'm setting up my new mh light. Its 175w with ballast. I need to know how to use/make a timer that I don't have to use a pugin. All the timers I got you can only use a pugin for. They are both 15amp. Can I use a pugin for the light or do I need to wire it up from a breaker?

What I was wanting to do was run a wire from the breaker to the timer and then a wire from the timer to the light. If it comes down to it I could take apart the timer and do it that way.

Any ideas or comments???

Someone must know what i'm talking about?

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Potentially dangerous here. Why not just plug a power strip into your timer?

I may have missed the point entirely.

I don't want to run a 175w bulb and ballast off of a pugin. The only timers I have are the kind that you have to pugin something to it. HTH

I'd say that nobody knows what a pugin is.

Check this Site OUT.... It it geared to European wireing but you can pretty much get an idea.

Grow Marijuana FAQ, Cannabis cultivation - marijuana growing tips & photos

Must be kinda like a plug in timer, except its a pugin timer. Why would you want to hard wire a timer circuit. If you do it makes it much harder to move in case you decide to add to, or change your setup. If you can wire from the breaker box to the timer, you should be able to install more receptacles instead and PLUG it in.

Just plug your timer into the plug in the wall.....

then run a 13amp lead to where your light/s are the put a male on the end to go into the timer and female plug on the end of your lead and plug your light/s in to it

if you need more then one plug add a 3-way plug to the female plug and you now have 4 plugs on one lead

you dont need a breaker that what a fuse box is for!

Menards carries the exact same timer as my hydro shop for less than 1/2 the price. It has a fifteen amp rating and since a 1000w hid uses about 9amps at start up you wouldn't want a higher amp rating than that. This timer can have 14 seperate cycles, with on-off times as low as one minute. It comes with internal batteries so you can unplug it and move it to a different recepticle without losing the program and costs a little over $17.00. I figure if the hydro shop carries it, its probably good enough for me.

I wouldn't recommend using a 3 way plug to add additional HID lights to a timer, Since they will all fire up at the same time. Use a seperate timer ofr each HID light.

VictorVIcious said:

I wouldn't recommend using a 3 way plug to add additional HID lights to a timer, Since they will all fire up at the same time. Use a seperate timer ofr each HID light.

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sry should have said thats how i have all my fans in/out and one in the room


but my light is on its own plug and timer

VictorVIcious said:

Menards carries the exact same timer as my hydro shop for less than 1/2 the price. It has a fifteen amp rating and since a 1000w hid uses about 9amps at start up you wouldn't want a higher amp rating than that. This timer can have 14 seperate cycles, with on-off times as low as one minute. It comes with internal batteries so you can unplug it and move it to a different recepticle without losing the program and costs a little over $17.00. I figure if the hydro shop carries it, its probably good enough for me.

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You're sadly misinformed.

Your half price 17 buck timer may well have an amperage rating of 15amps, but that's the resistive load, you're interested in the inductive load rating of the relay switch, which typically for a resistive load of 15 amps will be about 2 or 3 amps inductive. Lights present an inductive load, as do fans and motors. Fires, toasters, ovens present a resistive load. This is why most timers like that have on the back of them 'Not suitable for use with HID or Fluorescent lighting'. Clearly a 9 amp start up loading (it's actually more than that, as the lamp igniter draws a heavy current load to start the lamp, the 9 amp rating for a 1000w system is the operating amperage draw, not start up draw) will weld the relay contacts together in a cheap timer like that in a matter of days.

This is why people using HID systems higher than about 250w use a contactor relay between their timer and their lights.

That is exactly why i posted the link to that site. It explains how to wire the proper timer to the light setup. and it explains wht was the reason for the regular timer failing.

I better run out and see why the timer I have been using since last september hasn't failed yet. I read that article to,and while informative, I knew i wasn't going to need that information for quite some time. Maybe thats cause I think the 200amp box I put in the room can carry the load I'm putting on it and if not I'll have to reset a breaker. I didn't mean to imply my situtaion should apply to large commercial operations. Please forgive me.

I suggested there be like a Micro grow room where everyone knows that were dealing with 1,2 3, 4 ,??? plants. But I did nto mean to imply any thing other than it was informative and if the person was to hook up a regular timer to a HPS it might cease to work, or it could work forever. ONly it will decide

Does anyone know if I need to use contactors with the large cfls?

Thanks

Thanks everyone for all the help. I think I know what to do now.